Is it weird that I have a liking for some games in each and every era?
That means that this theory only applies to people who were never that into gaming. If you are determined enough even a late-wave Millennial can collect Ocarina of Time, or download a game like Pong.
Plus, I know most people appreciate games back to the era of the original Zelda and SUper Mario Brothers.
Wow. That's funny. I think that punk is actually very much doing it's job of hiding in plain sight. There are a ton of varying principals and ethos that go into punk rock. Rules that are generally enforced on the scene that function as a sort of "don't talk about fight club" thing. By the time that it reaches the main stream, noisy if the artists that choose to go that route somewhat divorce themselves from their roots (usually not all the way). And for guys who are really cagey about money and the ethics there in, that scene somehow always seems to be flush with it.Originally Posted by JordanGoodspeed
I know a guy who left Bethesda Software to go do a start up with another guy from another gaming company. Now if you asked me "who has more cash, that guy or Fat Mike from NOFX?" Fat Mike by far. Even though the music industry has been hit hard since 2008, there are still tons of bands paying tons of shows, and they're packing houses. Against Me! had one of the most critically acclaimed albums of 2014. Rise Against is apparently something people still listen to. Tim Armstrong produced a Grammy Award winning reggae album. Blink-182 is still breaking up because what Tom DeLonge truely loves is disappointing people, and he couldn't continue to do that and keep playing music.
Not only that, but there are tons of new bands, both here and abroad. Thanks to Spotify and some blogs, I can stay out of the way of the scene, which is a young man's game, and can still stay current. And it's all still going. This week, I've been listening to a lot of Masked Intruder and The Turkletons. Last week it was A Wilhelm Scream.
I don't go to shows nearly as often as I used to, but the few I've hit up, I'm now on the extreme end of "old", and I'm not really going to see newer acts (the band maybe new, but the band members are all from old acts) but it's definitely a whole lot of teenagers (which is why I'm less inclined to go). Same as it ever was. The kids dress differently, but other than a few aesthetics, it's so similar it's almost depressing if you stare into it long enough.
In a wider sense, pop music in general is covered in punk rock taint. It's assembled like hip hop, but the progressions are all pop punk (which is honestly what punk started out as, a larger the Ramones and The Buzzcocks. Harder styles are actually less "pure", and came later in most cases). Every time I happen across a newer pop song, I frequently find myself thinking "no, they're not covering <insert popular punk rock song here>."
As to teeth, I'm really going to have to ask what you actually mean. I've just spent too much time listening, and to me it's this long continuous tradition of being snotty, young, and irritable.
Not at all. Some of my friends have done old arcade games, and I can spend forever paying Missile Command, then jump in and play pretty much any Mario Kart or Smash Brothers. I'm a total sucker for Tekken.I spent all winter paying newer turn based strategy games, patiently awaiting the time suck that is Fallout 4. The spice of life, so the say.
Yeah, like I said, I'm not really a member of the scene. I agree that punk has completely taken over (white) pop music. That was how I originally thought of punk when I first heard it in middle school, as goofy pop music a la Blink- 182 and Good Charlotte, and later emo since the turn of the Millennium. Note that I realize that "emo" has a formal definition, but I use it colloquially (as do most people I know) as a generic term for most of the whiny "rock" that's come out in the last fifteen years. I later had a number of friends who were sharpies and/or really into the whole Celt-punk or hardcore scenes, who dragged me to a bunch of shows and clubs that used to be big back in the 80s, and they were either dead or filled with shiny happy teens listening to the aforementioned"emo". I later met kids born in the mid to late 90s who played in/listened to punk bands, and they were all super progressive, proudly PC types who were about as threatening and edgy as a Beagle puppy. A far cry from the image that had been presented to me from 80s movies and documentaries, and the 30 and 40 something Irish American guys reminiscing about heroin dealers, headbutting Nazis, and fat naked guys getting arrested for shitting on stage. So, like I said, defanged. I dunno, I wasn't there in the 70s and 80s, and I know there were lots of things like New Wave that were a lot softer, so I've clearly been fed a romanticized view of it, but that's where I'm coming from. Germany was a little bit more like it when I was still in the infantry, but as far as I can tell the influx of money and attention improved the comic book and video game industries, and diluted punk to teeny bopper music. YMMV, but nothing I've seen ever made me want to look into it further, and I save my Youtubing for other genres.
Last edited by JordanGoodspeed; 03-03-2015 at 07:07 PM.
I recall playing the Sonic series as a kid and it being a big deal for my age group as well (for those who played). That was the height of my video game interest--the 16 bit era, and I played a lot of 8 bit era games.
Silents and Boomers can understand the draw of something like Tetris, I've seen more than my share of those age groups through the years playing that on their computers. But then again that's the difference, isn't it?And really, once you get to 5th and 6th gen, you can just add Millennial cuspers to both those and once you get to 7th and 8th gen, it's "e'rebody but Boomers and Silents". Xers weren't really cool with videogames until about the tail end of 6th gen consoles, where you started to see titles like Call of Duty.
Tomb Raider and WWII games were aimed largely at an audience of Xer young adults (that was the intended audience). I forget where I saw the statistic but WWII games are largely bought & played by Xers more than any other age group--it fits, as the subconscious Xer dream was always to try and be like grandma & grandpa GI.
In fact the original intention of PlayStation as a console with its games was to aim for an older audience of Xers.
~Chas'88
Last edited by Chas'88; 03-03-2015 at 07:19 PM.
"There have always been people who say: "The war will be over someday." I say there's no guarantee the war will ever be over. Naturally a brief intermission is conceivable. Maybe the war needs a breather, a war can even break its neck, so to speak. But the kings and emperors, not to mention the pope, will always come to its help in adversity. ON the whole, I'd say this war has very little to worry about, it'll live to a ripe old age."
I was raised on 16-bit games as well. For me the two gaming companies growing up were Sega and Nintendo, and when Sony came out with the Playstation I was mildly contemptuous, though it grew on me. When Microsoft moved in I was really horrified, and when console gaming came down to a contest between the Xbox(x) and Playstation(y) I had already moved on. My friend who's a fellow '86 cohort and I were laughing recently that it was funny that both of us moved from playing videogames to playing sports when we got to high school, only for it to go mainstream for our age group and having to get into it later.
*was a strict Sega partisan until after the Saturn debacle*
SoCal, early - mid 80s. Did what I could prior to turning 21, then when I hit the magic number in '84 went to clubs in earnest. Serious dives with small but brutal pits. Besides the usual body slam action, there would be the odd elbow or fist from time to time. Glad I still have all my real teeth! Now, in spite of the controlled but pointed violence inherent in the mosh pits of yore, when one of us would take a fall, multiple hands would reach down and pull the person right back up. Crowd surfing, been there done that. It was a magical juncture in the space-time continuum. Part of the experience involved the infamous "Nardcore" - I was very lucky to be in the right place at the right time.
Last edited by XYMOX_4AD_84; 03-03-2015 at 10:12 PM.
My first system was the NES in '89, but my parents got me an SNES and Game Boy as soon as the came out. I definitely identify with the 4th and 5th gen games. I'm still of the opinion that Final Fantasy 6 and Chrono Trigger are the greatest RPGs of all time and nobody is going to convince me otherwise!
The N64 is the newest console I have, I went over to playing computer games after that point (Civ2 Master Race!!!).
Last edited by Odin; 03-03-2015 at 10:57 PM.
To recommend thrift to the poor is both grotesque and insulting. It is like advising a man who is starving to eat less.
-Oscar Wilde, The Soul of Man under Socialism
That stuff is always going on somewhere, fortunately not everywhere and not all the time. I've never headbutted a Nazi, but we've had our fair share of fights. That shit sucked. I'm glad they're gone from this area. I hatred having to fight some racist because he thought he had some right to a club. I'm glad the straight edge thug crowd from Richmond got the boot, too. Nothing like getting held at knife point because you were smoking a cigarette (back when you could do that at shows) or getting jumped because you ordered a beer.
People can keep their fangs. If I'm going to fight, it's not going to be because Moby got out of his car.
See, I always view aimed at and who picks it up as "who picks it up". Usually, yes, first person shooters, especially those that are WWII are aimed at Gen X and they will buy it, but the pain truth is that up until the mid-2000's, videogames were mostly for Xers, by Xers, but mostly funded (meaning bought) by Millennials simply because up to that point in time, more Millennials played proportionately to their populations.
I think that they really tried hard with Playstation 1 to nab the Xer market with titles like Resident Evil, but they were really landing cuspers. Sega Genesis tried, but their titles still frequently came up kiddy (Sonic), silly (Altered Beast), or both (Toe Jam and Earl (which was probably my favorite game for the Genesis)). One title I really liked was Earthworm Jim. He doesn't seem to come up when Nostalgia is referenced nearly as often. Was this game a hit with anyone else.
I think what you're describing is a difference in approach, not core philosophies. This is about how they present themselves, and are presented by society - as well as a huge propaganda war being fought out very slowly.
Shock rock - it's pretty much centered on an appeal to later prophets, nomads, and earlier civics. That aspect of punk (metal, rock, or music in general) probably isn't going to come back for a while, but it was a pretty huge part of that so-Cal hardcore movement that spawned a dozen influences that have outlived the appeal of shock and edge. The progressive part of punk was always there, but shock rock can't be PC, so a group had to gin up controversial ways of saying progressive things.
(As an interesting aside on an evolution chain involving shock rock, going backwards: Someone convinced me to give Kanye a chance and I immediately recognized the riff and the beat as a Marilyn Manson song. It's a solid riff - VERY catchy - but you're not going to get rich selling shock rock to younger civics and early artists. It sells better in a pop/hip-hop package, and no offense to the contenders I'ma let 'em finish, but that makes Kanye one of the best business-people in his generation.
BTW Manson stole it too, turns out it was early glam rock from the late 60s. And it's not like rock was the only one that re-purposing 2T music to get a shock reaction in a 3T. Gen X adolescents loved that kinda shit, and the more their parents hated it, the more they loved it! They are NOT about to start buying it for their kids, however. [civics will muahahahaa])
The fact that punk - and large parts of its relatively progressive ethos - is merely a modern pop culture feature is practically an epic victory. It's certainly a step up from being misrepresented in the media and attacked as a violent, drug-addled, and existential threat to society. The fear was that by crossing over in to the mainstream and becoming an influence in pop, punk would be stripped of its ideals. Instead, their ideals came with the sounds and musicians, and found a place in the mainstream. As reference to the hippy rant thread, you can be as radical as you want, but if you don't get to work it doesn't really matter. If the work's good and gets traction, you might not even need the fangs anymore.
With regards to romanticization, it cuts both ways. While there was a lot of rage being released, the shows and clubs weren't the hostile environment that it was often portrayed as. The 30 to 40 something Irish guys in the 3T punk scene makes me laugh, because they would have basically been Irish nomads escaping the troubles and chasing the party. It somehow seems so fitting when you add them to the stereotyped portrayals.
Now granted - if the 3T music scene was an all-night party, I got there barely 15 minutes before the lights went on and the cops showed up.
Also: None of this has anything to do with video games, because I wouldn't really want to tell the party I was going home to play RPGs on S/NES after the cops let me off.
Those words, "temperate and moderate", are words either of political cowardice, or of cunning, or seduction. A thing, moderately good, is not so good as it ought to be. Moderation in temper, is always a virtue; but moderation in principle, is a species of vice.
'82 - Once & always independent
Yeah, man, I gotcha. I aged out of all of that myself. I just remember getting dragged to a lot of goofy things 10 years ago by dudes desperate to hang on to something from high school and not getting it, like CBGBs in late 2005. Like I said, Germany was better, cause pop culture wise they were still in the 80s, which was great, but nothing ever really impressed me during the age (late teens to mid-20s) when those sorts of things might have mattered to me. But you asked what I meant, and that was it.
John,
Sure, I can see that. Absolutely. It is also really funny to me to see that the 4T "cleaning of the culture" that S&H predicted is occurring, but from a left wing, totally pc perspective rather than the Moral Majority stuff they thought. On the other hand, I really wonder what else they have to say, particularly when it's basically another middle-class "Lifestylism" thing, at this point.he fact that punk - and large parts of its relatively progressive ethos - is merely a modern pop culture feature is practically an epic victory. It's certainly a step up from being misrepresented in the media and attacked as a violent, drug-addled, and existential threat to society. The fear was that by crossing over in to the mainstream and becoming an influence in pop, punk would be stripped of its ideals. Instead, their ideals came with the sounds and musicians, and found a place in the mainstream. As reference to the hippy rant thread, you can be as radical as you want, but if you don't get to work it doesn't really matter. If the work's good and gets traction, you might not even need the fangs anymore.
Some of them maybe, but most of the people I'm talking about were blue-collar guys from big cities somewhere on the punk->Military->Firefighter/Cop/Construction worker track.With regards to romanticization, it cuts both ways. While there was a lot of rage being released, the shows and clubs weren't the hostile environment that it was often portrayed as. The 30 to 40 something Irish guys in the 3T punk scene makes me laugh, because they would have basically been Irish nomads escaping the troubles and chasing the party. It somehow seems so fitting when you add them to the stereotyped portrayals.
Yeah, true, but on the other hand,Also: None of this has anything to do with video games, because I wouldn't really want to tell the party I was going home to play RPGs on S/NES after the cops let me off.
I think the original point has been conceded.Usually, yes, first person shooters, especially those that are WWII are aimed at Gen X and they will buy it, but the pain truth is that up until the mid-2000's, videogames were mostly for Xers, by Xers, but mostly funded (meaning bought) by Millennials simply because up to that point in time, more Millennials played proportionately to their populations.
No, reread the quote. Just because the games were intended to be for Xers doesn't mean that the people who played were Xers. Gaming was extremely niche amongst Boomers (I've only known two maybe who were into it, but man they were really into it), even though the initial developers were all Boomers, but both the number of developers and the number of customers was so small you couldn't say they had much of a market at all. The same is true for most of Gen X. By the time 1985 hit, about 20% of Xer birth years were over the age of 20. I doubt many 16 year olds were doing to pick up a $300 console either. So right off the bat we've got about half the generation that isn't going to connect with the product because they're age inappropriate. A few did of course, but it was very rare.
The real market, from 8-bit on, was always Millennials, even though the devs were always aiming for X. That's probably why gaming stuck with Millennials, and why it became the new normal: there was always enough content that was just beyond their age range to keep it from being purely kid stuff. It looked like it was going to go that route in the early 90's, but then Street Fighter and Mortal Kombat came out. Then Doom and Wolfenstein.
They aimed for X. They got some. The got some Boomers too. Maybe the occasional Silent or GI, even. But none of these markets were anything compared to the size of the Millennial market they picked up. Just because you market to a specific segment doesn't mean you get it, and sometimes you get an entirely different market on accident.
Don't do that, dude. I can't really copy and paste on my phone, but go back and read your and John's first posts on this thread. The key words being "target audience" and"marketed".
For clarity's sake, let me do it for you.
First post by Kepi, (emphasis mine)
First post by John, (emphasis yada yada yada)I think you're jacking your early gen console matches, because you're missing out on who the target audience was. Videogames were considered toys by both boomers and first wave and core Xers. Late wave Xers s were a little more lax with it, but not that much. 8-bit consoles were aimed at millennial cuspers and very late wave Xers. Nintendo's success was an extreme surprise, because Atari collapsed gaming after the E.T. debacle. Gaming being normal/socially acceptable in the mainstream past elementary school was pretty much exclusively a Millennial phenomenon.
And really, once you get to 5th and 6th gen, you can just add Millennial cuspers to both those and once you get to 7th and 8th gen, it's "e'rebody but Boomers and Silents". Xers weren't really cool with videogames until about the tail end of 6th gen consoles, where you started to see titles like Call of Duty.
and first post by me,I think the Atari really was marketed toward Xers, but it never had the kind of pull that later 8bit consoles had. Sega also went out of their way to market more toward a Gen X type of crowd, but they never got the sales that Nintendo got with their Millennial-oriented marketing teams.
So while it was never particularly successful in terms of a marketing strategy, there was definitely an effort to sell Xers videogames. Besides, the Xers who had hobbies and interests that weren't mainstream (like gaming, even reading) were the ones that ended up influencing millennial culture - so even though they were a minority at the time, they're the minority that matters now (in this context).
And after the punk digression (the point of which I'll cheerfully yield), this post by you,Gonna have to agree with John on this one. Consider Tron, and the arcade culture it depicts at the beginning. Videogames were definitely an Xer thing in the beginning, though they weren't as ubiquitous with them as they were with Millies. On a purely anecdotal level, my older siblings, those of my friends growing up, and their friends were almost all gamers. Doesn't mean every Xer was, but there was definitely a point when games and game systems were marketed towards Xers, even if only a subset of them.
So, we are all in agreement that video were originally marketed to Xers. Now, if what you wanted to really argue is that Millennials as a whole were more into video games than Xers were, and did most of the purchasing (well, their parents at least), nobody is arguing with you. See here,See, I always view aimed at and who picks it up as "who picks it up". Usually, yes, first person shooters, especially those that are WWII are aimed at Gen X and they will buy it, but the pain truth is that up until the mid-2000's, videogames were mostly for Xers, by Xers, but mostly funded (meaning bought) by Millennials simply because up to that point in time, more Millennials played proportionately to their populations.
I think that they really tried hard with Playstation 1 to nab the Xer market with titles like Resident Evil, but they were really landing cuspers. Sega Genesis tried, but their titles still frequently came up kiddy (Sonic), silly (Altered Beast), or both (Toe Jam and Earl (which was probably my favorite game for the Genesis)). One title I really liked was Earthworm Jim. He doesn't seem to come up when Nostalgia is referenced nearly as often. Was this game a hit with anyone else.
and here,I think the Atari really was marketed toward Xers, but it never had the kind of pull that later 8bit consoles had. Sega also went out of their way to market more toward a Gen X type of crowd, but they never got the sales that Nintendo got with their Millennial-oriented marketing teams.
So while it was never particularly successful in terms of a marketing strategy, there was definitely an effort to sell Xers videogames. Besides, the Xers who had hobbies and interests that weren't mainstream (like gaming, even reading) were the ones that ended up influencing millennial culture - so even though they were a minority at the time, they're the minority that matters now (in this context).
I could go on. Since you have acknowledged that video games were originally marketed towards Xers, we're all saying the same thing. Woo hoo, the hive mind strikes again!Gonna have to agree with John on this one. Consider Tron, and the arcade culture it depicts at the beginning. Videogames were definitely an Xer thing in the beginning, though they weren't as ubiquitous with them as they were with Millies. On a purely anecdotal level, my older siblings, those of my friends growing up, and their friends were almost all gamers. Doesn't mean every Xer was, but there was definitely a point when games and game systems were marketed towards Xers, even if only a subset of them.
Of course: they were chasing the jobs more so than the party - but the party happens to be near where the jobs and money are at! (Construction: Belfast->Dublin->Berlin->NYC->Miami)
I'm actually just amused at how accurate this stereotype seems to be, or how I missed it for so long. Now I can't imagine a late 80s punk show without my FIL sitting in the back, slightly older than the rest of the crowd, slamming his tenth beer and shouting: "You call that a fight!?"
Those words, "temperate and moderate", are words either of political cowardice, or of cunning, or seduction. A thing, moderately good, is not so good as it ought to be. Moderation in temper, is always a virtue; but moderation in principle, is a species of vice.
'82 - Once & always independent
It's a real stereotype, for the guys from Boston, Nyc, and Chicago who are "Irish" (most of the people I'm referring to) as much as the actual Irish people from, you know, Ireland (whom we ran into while in German, though occasionally here as well). My friend and I were just in Newburyport, talking to an actual Irish guy, and we were laughing at the extent to which the stereotype held true/was played to. I have no idea how that image wasn't in your head already, "Oi" types being one of the first things that pop into my head when the word "punk" is said. Different social experience, I guess.
I dunno! Irish influence on punk was always kinda obvious but I guess I just never thought much about how it specifically happened beyond The Pogues.
Social experience probably varied strongly on regional lines. Around that same time, Jacksonville was home to the southern rock revival: Molly Hatchet, The Allman Brothers Band, 38 Special, The Outlaws, and Lynyrd Skynyrd. Generally had to go out of your way (and piss off a lot of people) to find any sort of "alternative" like punk/metal/rap/etc.
Those words, "temperate and moderate", are words either of political cowardice, or of cunning, or seduction. A thing, moderately good, is not so good as it ought to be. Moderation in temper, is always a virtue; but moderation in principle, is a species of vice.
'82 - Once & always independent
HEY!! I play Freecell!
" ... a man of notoriously vicious and intemperate disposition."
Yea I don't think that's weird in the slightest. The internet definitely gives the opportunity to experience all different eras of creativity, to find one's personal favorites or just games that are uniquely well-made.
Plus, all the development studios are being acquired and merged in to megacorps who believe a game should have a huge budget and a short play-time. EA has made some great games, but I can't remember the last one that wasn't a sequel of some acquired IP. Even those publish with horrible glitches and stability issues.
Seems like all the experimental stuff is happening with small indie studios, so they're practically publishing the same level of complexity as some of those old 8-16 bit games, with the added bonus of being able to fit them on to phone apps.
Those words, "temperate and moderate", are words either of political cowardice, or of cunning, or seduction. A thing, moderately good, is not so good as it ought to be. Moderation in temper, is always a virtue; but moderation in principle, is a species of vice.
'82 - Once & always independent
Agree that mobile seems to be where things are at/going these days. It would also be interesting to compare what's going on with video game studios this go around with what was going on with movie studios at the end of the last saeculum. I suspect, but don't know and don't presently have time to research, that there might just be a lot of parallels.
Thank you for clarifying. We all agree. We really need to start using this give mind thing for either something more useful or more amusing.For clarity's sake, let me do it for you.
First post by Kepi, (emphasis mine)
First post by John, (emphasis yada yada yada)
and first post by me,
And after the punk digression (the point of which I'll cheerfully yield), this post by you,
So, we are all in agreement that video were originally marketed to Xers. Now, if what you wanted to really argue is that Millennials as a whole were more into video games than Xers were, and did most of the purchasing (well, their parents at least), nobody is arguing with you. See here,
and here,
I could go on. Since you have acknowledged that video games were originally marketed towards Xers, we're all saying the same thing. Woo hoo, the hive mind strikes again!
Out if curiosity, what are you guys opinions on voice acting? My personal opinion is that it's actually reduced the level of innovation in games by forcing them to be more linear due to cost and data size constraints. There are a few examples where that hasn't been the case, but those are major, major games.
One of the previously mentioned games was Chronotrigger, and the thing is that for a long time, that was the most varied game play experience you could get in a game for a long time, and even now, it's rarely exceeded, and that's mostly because you can only afford so much (decent) voice acting. A widely varied series of outcomes would be exceedingly expensive.
What's making indie development so good right now is that they're capable of avoiding the trappings of being cinematic, which allows them to tell non-linear stories, or tell more than one narrative in one story. I like some aspects of cinematic game play, And I think some games handle it well and others would be better off without the trappings of trying to establish a film like environment.
That's why the card games were always on the computers IMO--to attract Silent and Boomer owners to back door gaming.
Because for some reason forming Canasta groups seems a very Lost/GI thing that the Silents and Boomers then publicly stayed away from non-gambling card games (like Gin Rummy, Double Solitare, Hearts, etc.) because of such a strong association with Lost/GIs. All the GIs I knew growing up were excellent card players--both male and female. So Silents/Boomers got computer card games so they could play non-gambling card games without the embarrassment of thinking you were like "your old man"/"your mom" with their organized card playing nights.
That at least was my interpretation of it as a child in the 1990s. Card games were seen as an "old people's" game, and Silents & Boomers were still eager to avoid being confused with being "old people" at that point.
Poker being the exception to the rule due to its association with gambling.
Last edited by Chas'88; 03-06-2015 at 10:13 PM.
"There have always been people who say: "The war will be over someday." I say there's no guarantee the war will ever be over. Naturally a brief intermission is conceivable. Maybe the war needs a breather, a war can even break its neck, so to speak. But the kings and emperors, not to mention the pope, will always come to its help in adversity. ON the whole, I'd say this war has very little to worry about, it'll live to a ripe old age."
Which is really funny because when I was in college, a cheap bottle of vodka, a case of beer, and Canasta or Spades was often the entirety of our weekend entertainment budget - split between four to six people. It's incredibly... practical. Not exciting, not extreme, just practical. Something to focus a gathering toward, something to fix the awkward moments and keep everyone on the same page.
My feelings toward video games are getting very similar. I am not a fan of the voice-over work and theatrical cut screens, because that tends to eat in to other parts of the development budget. Movies and plays just deliver a more authentic theatrical experience.
I used to love watching the technology advance, but I've come back around to the idea that a game should last a really long time and offer a lot of replay time like Civilization, Sim City, etc. Realism is also kind of... overrated. Real life already has an ultra-realistic, HD, multiplayer game going on - and games are supposed to be a short, refreshing break from that. (It really kicked me hard in WoW, working away in their ultra-realistic trading economy, when I realized I could be working on a "real" online business instead - doing all the same things, but earning USD instead of WoWgold. What's the point of the game, again?)
I also don't like the fact that modern games try to hand everything to you and overwhelm your senses. Older games relied on more abstract and symbolic graphics, and left the majority of the audio/visual work to be done in the players' heads. On that thought, I've actually been getting back in to the paper and pen D&D stuff after almost 20 years of being unable to find anyone to play with. 5th edition is still new, but it is definitely my favorite version since AD&D 2.0 - and it seems to be hitting at a time when a lot of gamers are getting jaded with video games. There are also a LOT more women who are interested in playing a game like D&D than there were 20 years ago, so the total community is much bigger than ever before. In a lot of ways, the newer version of D&D is also just better thanks to ancillary technology: photoshop to make maps, smartphones to cross-reference rule disputes, and large online communities to exchange ideas and content. It can be a cheap game, but it doesn't have to be.
Those words, "temperate and moderate", are words either of political cowardice, or of cunning, or seduction. A thing, moderately good, is not so good as it ought to be. Moderation in temper, is always a virtue; but moderation in principle, is a species of vice.
'82 - Once & always independent
