It's All In Good Humor

[Casual Shinji]

I actually thought Okami mixed humor with serious cataclysm very well. But that's mainly due to the visuals and the jibber-jabber language. Still, it felt serious, creepy, and dangerous when it needed to be, but could still make you laugh without feeling out of tone with the rest of the game.

 

[hermes]

Ok, maybe I am in the minority here, but I was surprised to find the humor in Brutal Legend pretty damn good. Specially surprised since I am not a big fan of Heavy Metal or Jack Black...

 

[JimB]

I don't know that I agree about references being the lowest form of humor (that's puns, says I), but it's certainly the laziest. As a role-player, I am often in the company of people who think that repeating a Futurama joke is the same thing as making a joke. It gets old. Fast.

 

[Balkan]

That reminds me of Max Payne 2 . It had so manny jokes , in otherwise a serious game .
Also I dont think that Comedy can work well on its own . I still havent watched a film , that is 100% comedy and its good (Grown ups , meet the spartans ) . It needs an interesting plot and characters to make things work . Even monkey island wasnt 100% comedy , its 50% jokes and 50% adventures .

 

[SecondPrize]

I think the Bard's Tale was successful in what Book of Unwritten Tales attempted. From the giant rat in the first quest to breaking barrels, it pokes fun at the rpg genre without explaining to you how clever it is in doing so.

 

[Proverbial Jon]

so where would Eat Lead: The Return of Matt Hazard fall into in this? the game had thoroughly bland mechanics, and was was extremely referential, but it did so in the same way that Mel Brooks movies are referential, and that made it a genuinely funny game for me.

It fell down because it was trying to be funny before it was trying to be a game. It did neither very well. There were a few amusing moments but the gameplay was so incredibly dull that those fleeting moments couldn't save the game for me.

Matt Hazard didn't just make the odd referential joke, instead it was trying to parody the entire history of video games, a big task that such an incompetent game was never going to pull off. Had the gameplay been varied and the combat fun to engage in then maybe the humour could have added to that, but as it stands Matt Hazard was so bland that it was almost insulting when it tried to poke fun at other games, even if it was with the best of intentions.

I tried to like that game, really I did!

 

[Nimzabaat]

I think that the back and forth between Isabella and Aveline (Dragon Age 2) was some of the funniest stuff i've heard. Actually most Bioware games have really funny bits in them. I also quite enjoyed the dialogue in Hunted: The Demons Forge.

 

[Something Amyss]

While Saints Row has a lot of over-the-top stuff, there's a lot of subtlety buried under the surface. While I would never compare it to the best in terms of film or literature, it certainly has a lot by comparison to other games.

...Then again, that's STILL not saying much.

The main problem with the whole comedy genre is that not everyone has the same tastes, which would be a killing blow for any triple-A game, hence the whole lowest-common denominator jokes that no-one finds funny.

The remake of The Bard's Tale wasn't all that bad and the two Overlord games were pretty decent comedy wise as well.

In trying to cover all their bases, none are covered.

I think sarcasm gets a bad rap for being "the lowest form of wit". Sarcasm can be quite nuanced sometimes. I agree though that referencing things is probably truly the lowest form of "wit".

Sarcasm gets called the lowest form of wit because it is not only possible to misuse it, but it's probably the most commonly misused form of wit. Even referential humour hits with the assumed market most of the time, because even if you have never played Portal you know "the cake is a lie" and even if you've never seen Scarface you know "say hello to my little friend" and people clap like trained seals.

Sarcasm is more common than the knock-knock joke, bad puns, and chicken crossing the road jokes combined, and like 99% of it is just...Bad. That's because so many people saw someone do it well and decided "that looks easy." Unfortunately, it's hard to tell someone their joke is off-key and we lack an appropriate Simon Cowell analogue to shoot people down. Sarcasm therefore spreads among people with neither self-awareness nor shame, and BAM! Lowest form of humour.

Really, it's just the form of humour most likely to be used poorly, but close enough for most people.

I agree with the point about referential humour from the article, but I also keep in mind that Epic Movie hits well with its audience. I am not its audience. I'm not sure any thinking person is its audience. It doesn't hurt that every joke seems to be followed by a mug to the audience. You know, the universal sign for "that was a joke. Laugh now."

So yes, it gets a bad rap. But mostly because referential humour tends to hit with its target audience.

 

[infinity_turtles]

...Sarcasm is supposed to be a form of humor? I mean, I certainly find it a more amusing way to show just how little I think of the specific thing I'm commenting on, but the "show how little I think of a thing" is more the point then the slight amusement I get out of it.

 

[Elf Defiler Korgan]

I wonder what Yahtzee thinks of Magicka and Kingdom of Loathing. Those are the two games that come the most readily to my mind when I hear "comedy" and "game" in the same sentence, outside of the ones that have already been mentioned of course.

Yes Magicka is hilarious. It also has referencing, but parts are funny in their own right and it is very violence based humour with some added chuckle inducing dialogue.

This reminds me once again, that while I like pc and console games, and even flash games when they are done right. If I want humour I get it from pen and paper games run by friends. Ideally everyone chills out, they get into junk food, crack jokes and do stupid stuff. I'm not sure if it is funnier being a player and participating, or being a dm and laughing at these jokers. I've seen other dms pull comedy off really well by throwing in odd npcs, animated pies and the strangest situations.

Yeah, pen and paper can be serious, but people are there for fun so they will also want to joke about. The most unfunny game I played in though, was vampire. Oh we are poor suffering vampires in a dark world without gags. Sheesh. I made an odd Lithuanian pagan vamp with a love of wood carving, an inherent laziness and a natural brilliance with the sabre, and he was so out of place.

 

[Mouse One]

I'm trying hard to think of actually funny games, but the Portal series is the only one that comes to mind. Even Infocom's Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (free online now, thanks BBC) was mostly amusing more than downright funny. And Douglas Adams wrote the text!

Maybe it's just a pacing thing. Videogames have a pace somewhat determined by the player, so that's going to interfere with the timing of a joke. But it isn't a complete show stopper, as Portal demonstrated.

Too bad. I prefer laughing to super serious. I play games for entertainment.

 

[czarevilsam]

I found Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time to be a witty and humourous game with a serious plot and characters.

 

[[Insert Name Here]]

Well, besides the fact that it was in the locked-in conversation style of Fallout, Old World Blues for New Vegas made me laugh quite a bit. And Blackadder RPG needs to be made. Now.

 

[Darth_Payn]

I feel like if anyone DEATH should be allowed to morose all the time lol

unfortunately it seems the opposite of a super serious lead character just leads to an annoyingly sarcastic and smugly overconfident character

Yes, DEATH should be grim and grumpy, but that should make him the perfect straight man to anything else.

 

[Blarkuntvhite]

I found the part in Book of Unwritten tales where you bury the (willing) grim reaper alive to be hilarious. It was just one of those moments where I had to think really hard how I got into this situation.
I don't know, it's funny to me.

The last time I had a good laugh in a game was in Assassin's Creed Revelations when you speak to Desmond's British friend, and he compares Europe to herpes or something.
Desmond's friends sound like they're shouting there lines at me, which just makes it funnier.

 

[maninahat]

I was a bit surprised to hear mention of Armed and Dangerous. It was great fun, but it seems scant few have actually played it.

Unfortunately, it's a little dated now. Shame, as the film clips are a big part of it, but the animations look god awful. If any game needs a HD remake...

That said, I enjoyed it. Hell, I bought it as soon as I heard it had a gun that shoots sharks.

Also I'll mention Stubbs the Zombie, which I also enjoyed in spite of its short comings (and its tendency towards cheap, toilet humour).

 

[Ragsnstitches]

I think sarcasm gets a bad rap for being "the lowest form of wit". Sarcasm can be quite nuanced sometimes. I agree though that referencing things is probably truly the lowest form of "wit". It basically amounts to "hey, here's a thing you know from somewhere else!". I admit I laugh to it a lot of the time because it's like an in joke. It's not exactly the cleverest thing in the world though.

I think Death has a bit of humour about him though. He doesn't take everything so seriously.

Also I love the sound of a Blackadder game. Someone needs to get on that right now.

I find the major issue with referential comedy now is that they highlight everything, with bells and whistles, big n' bright neon lights and a laugh track to makes sure you didn't miss it.

There was a time where subtle references (which I believe is Yahtzees gripe) were something special for the eagle eyed viewer.

Can't speak for others, but I fondly remember playing games 10+ years ago where they would have some secret room, or maybe a particular character/item, maybe some spoken lines/written text that that would be referencing something else. But it would be an aside, something to be noticed by those in the know.

Now, as I said already, there is a fucking fan fare for every reference. Some games still get it, they craft a bit of scenery to blend into the world, but to a passer by in the know would have significantly more meaning then someone who isn't. Maybe an encounter with some random NPC that to some is just another NPC spouting generic NPC phrases, but to those clued in offers some witty line about another series or maybe even self-referential.

Alas, the lowest common denominator drags bar even further down. Its numbing to say the least.

 

[bificommander]

Well, I'm right now in Guild Wars 2 fanboy mode (give it a week or two and it'll subside), but I think the designers had a nice deal of fun with the Asura's storylines and dialogues. Though I admit, most of the funny stuff is again in background events and conversations of NPCs.

Also, while I'm fanboying let me mention one of my fanboy crushes that never subsided, Sacrifice. The player character was a 'thou shallst' spouting straightman, but you had a fun sarcastic sidekick. Plus the gods were a lot of fun. Add that to some imaginative units with some of their own funny dialogue (does the unit that has 'I find my lack of health... disturbing' as his dying soundbyte count as referential humor? They do at least make an actual joke from it) and you had a fun little experience. But I think it's from about the same era as armed and dangerous.

 

[marurder]

Forsooth, methinks you are no ordinary talking chicken!