I don't think anyone ignores these issues Acroscopic, I just don't think it's my place to objectively decide what the truth is in this matter. Games arouse players, I agree - that's why players play them. But it's a long way from that concept to blaming a game or gaming for incidents like this one in real life.
It certainly is not the duty of gamers to undertake or even understand scientific research into the long-term effects of videogames on one's perception of reality. Neither should anyone stop watching TV or surfing the internet or using a mobile phone because of the perception of possible long-term effects of doing so. My personal opinion is that I would be incredibly surprised if gaming had any more negative effect on people or society than any other art form or medium - the ball is in the court of those who seek to prove different.
Surely one thing we all agree on - silly scare stories like this do nothing to advance the debate in the slightest.
It seems to me that there is a deep suspicion of Nintendo simply because they don't work on shit-brown post-apocalyptic particle-effect FPS games. Which amounts to heresy in the current climate of 'hardcore' gamers, or 'bigots' as I like to call them...
All well and good, but the games have to be appealing enough to find a market - are Microsoft sure that a karaoke and quiz game will be enough to make waves in the marketplace? It sounds as if Microsoft have a viable strategy to go for casual gamers, without actually having any real content to offer. To really do this they need titles to compete with Nintendo's best titles, and I don't see quite how you just invent that sort of quality of software without significant time and money.
I wouldn't make a distinction between a cut-scene and any other component part of a game - if that component serves no real purpose it will probably worsen the experience of playing the game and should be cut. The trouble particularly with cut-scenes in games is that more often than not they have been time-consuming to prepare, and also they often look more technologically advanced than the actual game engine, so they are retained almost regardless of their actual function to the story or gameplay, or more often lack of it. The reason there is disdain for cut-scenes is that there have been so many thousands of almost unspeakably bad ones in gaming history.
My favourite cut-scene of all time is about 3 seconds long - it's where the protagonist in Another World (aka Out of this World) spots something on the ground in the 2D gameplay environment, and in a swift 3D cut-scene is shown stooping down and picking up a gun, signifying a whole change of emphasis in the game.
Actually a couple of my other favourites don't rely on spoken dialogue either. The opening to Fallout absolutely sets up that game - a black and white programme on a television screen spouting inanities, while the camera pulls out to reveal a post-apocalyptic wasteland. Also the menu screens on Valve games are a master-stroke in my opinion - essentially they are cut-scenes of the empty scenery in the game, almost inviting the player to breathe life into these immersive environments.
These examples bely the commonly held belief that cut-scenes = dialogue, which I think is one of the biggest misconceptions in the industry - the idea that stories happen when someone starts speaking and that we ought to stop and listen to it, which is utter nonsense. Look at the more mature visual media - paintings or film. The masters of those arts realised that you don't 'tell' stories, you 'show' them. Hitchcock told his stories through expressive visuals, montage, or simply the subtext provided by the character's eyes or expressions while the largely mundane dialogue is spoken. He'd be turning in his grave at what passes for a dramatic scene in nearly all videogames.
This all goes along with the idea that games designers only bring in the scriptwriters when there is dialogue to add, which is an utter misconception of the role of writers in any other art-form. It's little wonder that 95% of cut-scenes are rather stilted dialogues - any proper film writer would flag up these scenes at the concept stage, and try and find visual ways of achieving the same functions.
Good luck with the book - I'm sure I will totally disagree with many of your choices, but that's okay. I think the process of creating a canon in terms of videogames has been a very slow one, but I think it's a useful thing that helps us understand the development and the worth of these game things :).
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Alex_V's Comments
I don't think anyone ignores these issues Acroscopic, I just don't think it's my place to objectively decide what the truth is in this matter. Games arouse players, I agree - that's why players play them. But it's a long way from that concept to blaming a game or gaming for incidents like this one in real life.
It certainly is not the duty of gamers to undertake or even understand scientific research into the long-term effects of videogames on one's perception of reality. Neither should anyone stop watching TV or surfing the internet or using a mobile phone because of the perception of possible long-term effects of doing so. My personal opinion is that I would be incredibly surprised if gaming had any more negative effect on people or society than any other art form or medium - the ball is in the court of those who seek to prove different.
Surely one thing we all agree on - silly scare stories like this do nothing to advance the debate in the slightest.
It seems to me that there is a deep suspicion of Nintendo simply because they don't work on shit-brown post-apocalyptic particle-effect FPS games. Which amounts to heresy in the current climate of 'hardcore' gamers, or 'bigots' as I like to call them...
All well and good, but the games have to be appealing enough to find a market - are Microsoft sure that a karaoke and quiz game will be enough to make waves in the marketplace? It sounds as if Microsoft have a viable strategy to go for casual gamers, without actually having any real content to offer. To really do this they need titles to compete with Nintendo's best titles, and I don't see quite how you just invent that sort of quality of software without significant time and money.
I wouldn't make a distinction between a cut-scene and any other component part of a game - if that component serves no real purpose it will probably worsen the experience of playing the game and should be cut. The trouble particularly with cut-scenes in games is that more often than not they have been time-consuming to prepare, and also they often look more technologically advanced than the actual game engine, so they are retained almost regardless of their actual function to the story or gameplay, or more often lack of it. The reason there is disdain for cut-scenes is that there have been so many thousands of almost unspeakably bad ones in gaming history.
My favourite cut-scene of all time is about 3 seconds long - it's where the protagonist in Another World (aka Out of this World) spots something on the ground in the 2D gameplay environment, and in a swift 3D cut-scene is shown stooping down and picking up a gun, signifying a whole change of emphasis in the game.
Actually a couple of my other favourites don't rely on spoken dialogue either. The opening to Fallout absolutely sets up that game - a black and white programme on a television screen spouting inanities, while the camera pulls out to reveal a post-apocalyptic wasteland. Also the menu screens on Valve games are a master-stroke in my opinion - essentially they are cut-scenes of the empty scenery in the game, almost inviting the player to breathe life into these immersive environments.
These examples bely the commonly held belief that cut-scenes = dialogue, which I think is one of the biggest misconceptions in the industry - the idea that stories happen when someone starts speaking and that we ought to stop and listen to it, which is utter nonsense. Look at the more mature visual media - paintings or film. The masters of those arts realised that you don't 'tell' stories, you 'show' them. Hitchcock told his stories through expressive visuals, montage, or simply the subtext provided by the character's eyes or expressions while the largely mundane dialogue is spoken. He'd be turning in his grave at what passes for a dramatic scene in nearly all videogames.
This all goes along with the idea that games designers only bring in the scriptwriters when there is dialogue to add, which is an utter misconception of the role of writers in any other art-form. It's little wonder that 95% of cut-scenes are rather stilted dialogues - any proper film writer would flag up these scenes at the concept stage, and try and find visual ways of achieving the same functions.
Good luck with the book - I'm sure I will totally disagree with many of your choices, but that's okay. I think the process of creating a canon in terms of videogames has been a very slow one, but I think it's a useful thing that helps us understand the development and the worth of these game things :).
All Alex_V's Comments