I do not like Western games at all (please read)

[Enigmatic_Apple]

Sorry about sounding like a jerk with that and missing something.

No problem!

1) "you have to remember that that is a facet of yourself ("that" being a tyranical, slave-driving warlord)."

Well, no--the 'facet' of myself is that that of being a democratic, social welfare state-embracing liberal who enjoys *playing* a tyranical, slave-driving warlord. You've confused enjoying *playing* something with enjoying actually *being* something.

2) "but would it make it any better if some, say, celestial being with absolute control over us was to use us as dolls to amuse itself?"

You're attacking a strawman here--I never made any point about it not being beastly because I have "absolute control" over those digital people. My point was that they are no more people than, say, an actual strawman. What makes it non-beastly for a farmer to put a strawman out in a field all day as opposed to a person is not that the farmer has absolute control over the strawman, it's that a strawman isn't a person at all. Same thing with my digital population in _Civilization_ or someone's digital stable of prostitutes in _GTA_.

edit:

"In a different situation than video games, we (as a human species, generally) view those malformed ink-blots we call people in comics and books subject them to the same standards as we do real people."

Well no--we really don't. We *conditionally* view them as such--'if that were for real, that person would be evil'. However we don't think of someone in a comic book as having caused as much suffering as someone who was real. At least, if we don't need professional help!

What I'm trying to illustrate to you is that there is a better definition of 'evil' or 'violence' than the one you have. That for something to be 'evil' or count as 'violence' it not only has to be these kind of acts, but it must also cause some sort of real-world suffering.

Are you guys talking shit about me? AGAIN?

 

[LordOmnit]

Okay, I laughed at the "digital stable of prostitutes" comment, I am officially horrible.
But either way, by the strawman you are also forgetting that that strawman has some semblance of intelligence, appearance of being human, and supposed (fingerquotes) "feelings" (not unlike many people in the world). The idea is that you are (supposed to I suppose) conceptualize yourself as being in that world, as that being. I'm not saying that it is totally wrong, since you can't get a full gameplay experience without doing evil, good, and the occasional neutral, but you have to remember that that *is* a part of you. If you are capable of doing something (even to a "strawman"), that *is a part* of you. But I suppose that I should have mentioned earlier that that part is probably under amazingly tight control because the general consensus is that the strawman is just that, straw, not anything, you know, somewhat trying to be a semblance of reality.

 

[LordOmnit]

No, the universe isn't Enigmatic_Apple-centric, we were finished with you about twelve dozen posts ago. Actually, I don't think that Cheeze ever was talking about or to you as far as I could tell.

And as for the 'evil' and 'violence' argument, the act of doing so or the act of imagining someone doing so is the same (conceptually) of it actually happening, which is why we use such broad-ranging words for describing the same 'type' of actions whether or not that are actually happening or not happening in reality.

 

[Enigmatic_Apple]

No, the universe isn't Enigmatic_Apple-centric, we were finished with you about twelve dozen posts ago. Actually, I don't think that Cheeze ever was talking about or to you as far as I could tell.

And as for the 'evil' and 'violence' argument, the act of doing so or the act of imagining someone doing so is the same (conceptually) of it actually happening, which is why we use such broad-ranging words for describing the same 'type' of actions whether or not that are actually happening or not happening in reality.

It didn't seem like he was talking about me, or even aware of my existence. But I guarantee you that conversation is about me. I am everything and nothing.

Minus the nothing part.

All jokes aside, do go on with your conversation. Very interesting read.

Even if it isn't about me.

 

[Daxelman]

Thing is, people don't die playing GTA or Halo, especially high school kids.

Yeah, but does that mean it's much better to have fun killing virtual people rather than real people? Saying that you have fun killing virtual people in an (somewhat) everyday situation is kind of weird if you ask me. But then again, "I would choose a boring world without violence and where everything is solved through a game of chess and some (insert culturally appropriate time-passing beverage not [necessarily] including alcohol) to drink," if I could.
Although I am highly against the idea that violent video games cause people to kill real people. I don't think that GTA (etc.) is going to cause people to go out and kill people.

Actually, I don't know where I was going with that....
....oh yeah, addiction, I guess we could tie that in, but I'll leave that to when yall go on again about Jack Thompson....

But Anyways, saying that American Games are uncreative, and there for suck, is the equality of shitting out of your mouth. This person is either really against the American Demographic, and God Forbid she get a Wii, or is fucking with us, and LAMO'in in her chair.

Or hasn't played Fallout.

 

[LordOmnit]

That would be really funny and wrong if she was sitting there, this being an elaborately constructed joke. I would laugh.
I suppose I have pretty much been saying that American games suck, haven't I? Well, I'm sure that most of the games that have ended up being so liberally being listed on this site are excellent, but there are also plenty of Japanese games that are just as good. Where am I going with this? Not really anywhere. I'm within a mile of the same spot I've been typing this spiel up the whole time, and even now I'm about three feet from where most of it shitted out of my head =P

 

[Desert Vulture]

Internet argument:

http://content.ytmnd.com/content/5/4/b/54bf1d60f8d40ad91e88d556f8c2288a.jpg

 

[LordOmnit]

True, KOTOR is no Twilight Princess. I mean non-linear gameplay mixed with customizable main character and the ability to choose your alignment and what you say to people is worse than a linear game with the inability to customize your character or choose your alignment or say anything at all where the plot is to rescue Zelda from Ganon(again).
I like the way you think.

Yeah, comparing a poor-quality story with a high-quality one is, of course, terrible.
We understand that western game developers know how to make dozens of possibilities, but if they aren't going to make a great story along with it, then they had better stop touting about being so great and amazing.
And comparing common plot devices, beginning, and end as the only things taken into account for a story is like trying to print a book without ink. It doesn't work too well. (Don't pull technicalities about the book metaphor, that isn't the point.)

 

[LordOmnit]

Well, before anyone bashes me about saying KoToR had a poor story, I will say that that was weak generalization, and I now mean a middle-quality story with a high-quality one.

 

[Daxelman]

That would be really funny and wrong if she was sitting there, this being an elaborately constructed joke. I would laugh.
I suppose I have pretty much been saying that American games suck, haven't I? Well, I'm sure that most of the games that have ended up being so liberally being listed on this site are excellent, but there are also plenty of Japanese games that are just as good. Where am I going with this? Not really anywhere. I'm within a mile of the same spot I've been typing this spiel up the whole time, and even now I'm about three feet from where most of it shitted out of my head =P

I wasn't directing it at you. The Thread creator was more of the target.

But it angers me with things like this, just like when people say the the Wii sucks because it has no hardcore games.

 

[LordOmnit]

Oops, sorry, bit of an ego there I guess.
The Wii doesn't suck because it doesn't have hardcore games, in fact, it doesn't suck at all in my mind, it just is being underutilized (as Yahtzee noted, the whole add-ons for the controllers is getting excessive). It would be the best if it came out with some high-quality games that don't have to be serious or anything, but so far it looks like Twilight Princess is the only game that is taking it to the next level.
I wonder if that is saying the same thing you are saying is wrong? If so then I have no way of defending myself in that other than that it could be better, but every other next-gen system could be also.

 

[Daxelman]

Oops, sorry, bit of an ego there I guess.
The Wii doesn't suck because it doesn't have hardcore games, in fact, it doesn't suck at all in my mind, it just is being underutilized (as Yahtzee noted, the whole add-ons for the controllers is getting excessive). It would be the best if it came out with some high-quality games that don't have to be serious or anything, but so far it looks like Twilight Princess is the only game that is taking it to the next level.
I wonder if that is saying the same thing you are saying is wrong? If so then I have no way of defending myself in that other than that it could be better, but every other next-gen system could be also.

Just to get it out there, I love Causal games, I've clocked in 300 hours of Bejeweled and 100 hours of MSN Billiards 8 Ball. It's a time waster.

Which was what games was created for. Entertainment, time wasters, time fillers, ways to get children out of your hair. Just because it doesn't have an OMG story, OMG gameplay, or SUPEROMG graphics, doesn't mean it sucks.

Don't get me wrong, I love the "hardcore" game, but then again, read the beginning of my post.

 

[LordOmnit]

"Or maybe all gaming is pointless, just playing with the gravel on the side of the big road of life..." -Yahtzee.
I think that sums it up nicely.

 

[LordOmnit]

I understand that you are going to say that the pixel-based, non-real, strawmen never had any liberty to begin with, because they were always dedicated to being constructs who do something that was predestined to happen to them.
But if you are going to go that far into the argument, then my personal beliefs technically restrict anyone from having any freedom, since I believe in a single, linear time-flow, wherein everything is thusly predetermined, and we can't change what is going to happen, as assuredly as I am going to end this sentence in a period.
But in that sense, I believe that we have merely already made the decision before we are given the choice at any point (thus ourselves being the predetermining factor), and therefore we are, in fact, "free" beings.
When you say that doing something that would be considered horrible in the real world in a fictional world isn't really bad because nobody is hurt, what you are, in effect, saying is that the concept isn't necessarily bad. Which is wrong, the concept is what is abhored, and the execution even moreso. If the concept isn't necessarily bad, then why should it matter where we apply it? But if it is, then application at all is bad.

 

[LordOmnit]

I think that we seem to have a barrier here (i.e.- language) that can't transmit our personal, philisophical beliefs (or at least mine I know for sure).
Maybe I'm just doing what I do most horrifically: overcomplicating everything.

 

[LordOmnit]

Well, I can't say that I feel you are doing any different, so probably the argument is a bit pointless to begin with, because I have probelms with your thought formulation also, but we can't really resolve it readily in this sort of format.