Monday, October 6, 2008

Be Careful. You Might Suck....Is That A Challenge?

In the 9/27/2008 episode of 1up yours, the crew responds to the topic of video game difficulty and whether or not games need to adhere to the convention of increasing in difficulty to the end. You can listen to the conversation starting at around 1:21:00.

Be Careful. You Might Suck

Before I get into my response to some of the comments from the podcast, I wanted to say that it is important to consider one's own gaming skills before addressing game difficulty of any particular game. When a game is properly (classically) designed with levels that are composed of game ideas that are gradually developed from simple to complex uses of the core mechanics and when the forms of the game communicate their function clearly, the difficulty of such a game is created in large part from the player's ability (or lack thereof) to learn/ utilize the instructive resources the game provides. In other words, it's not the game's fault you aren't paying attention to the clues or using/thinking about the mechanics in the way the game has carefully taught you to. Furthermore, when a game allows the players to adjust the difficulty of the challenges, understanding how difficult the game is is a matter of understanding how the adjustable game elements circumvent the require use of the core mechanics and what effects doing so has on the game experience as a whole. In this way, game difficulty starts in the design but rests on the player.

Video games are functionally just controlled learning environments or electronic teachers. In the same way the best teachers can make learning fun, exciting, and easy, the best designed games can take the frustration and difficulty out of the learning processes. In such cases, all there is left for the player to struggle with to complete a challenge is the execution. In general, the execution of core mechanics needed to complete most of the challenges in most video games is relatively simple. For example, aiming and shooting in most FPSs is pretty simple. Understanding when to shoot, where to aim, when to take cover, and other battle strategies comprise the majority of what the player must learn to be successful.

For another example, the input for the mechanics in Mega Man 9 are very simple reflecting the design of the NES era. Everyone understands that holding the JUMP button down makes Mega Man JUMP the highest. Because the JUMP mechanic is direct, letting go of the JUMP button instantly causes Mega Man to drop while quickly tapping the button makes him hop around. The SHOOT mechanic is even simpler. Hit the SHOOT button and a bullet comes out. Along with the MOVE mechanic the player has all the abilities necessary to progress through the vast majority of the game. From this simple base, the levels are designed to test the player's ability to control space by jummping (vertical) and shooting (horizontal). The best part of such a design is, to get through the majority of challenges, players simply have to use some combination of MOVE, JUMP, and SHOOT. With such a simple set of possible solutions, it's hard to imagine that some gamers have an incredibly difficult time understanding how to overcome the game's challenges.

For these reasons (and for these), I do not believe Mega Man 9 is "really too hard" or "brutal" as John Davison and Shane Bettenhausen describe in the podcast. You would think that these game enthusiasts/writers would be able to breeze through a game like Mega Man 9 considering how similar it is to several other Mega Man games that have been out for many years. If Shane can understands how the calculator class in Final Fantasy Tactics is the most powerful class because of how his abilities evolve across his/her long term development, then surely he should be able to understand and use the tools Capcom made easily available in Mega Man 9 to help players get through the game.

The more I hear games writers talk about how difficult games are, the more I believe that they're not very good at video games. I've written before about how the concept of "skill" can be broken down into 5 categories: dexterity, timing, knowledge, reflex, and adaptation. I don't expect game writers to have the dexterity and timing of a Piano virtuoso (or a Guitar Hero for that matter). I don't expect them to have encyclopedic (or gamefaqs level) knowledge of a game. I don't expect their reflexes to match the Ogre Brothers or any other FPS twitch fire master. And I don't expect them to be able to adapt to dynamically changing situations with the ease of a StarCraft master. These video game writers may not be the best at video games, but I do expect them to be good enough to where their extensive experience with analyzing and playing games allows them to reach the insights necessary to understand the intricacies of what a game really is and how it works including its difficulty.

Personally, I know the insight that I bring to my writing is greatly aided by my diverse skill set. Ignoring my experience in fields outside of gaming for the purposes of this dicussion, pushing myself to develop the skills to become a world class Super Smash Brothers player helpd me understand game difficulty for all games in a number of ways.

No matter what game I play, as long as a game is designed around understanding mechanics and the skillful execution of those mechanics (as opposed to luck or stat building), I haven't found a challenge that's more difficult than fighting against the nation's best. Though my opponents pushed me beyond the limits of my dexterity, reflexs, timing, and adaptation, the game itself didn't become any more difficult. In those touranment matches, we still played by the same rules that I had a deep knowledge of. The amount of individuality each player brings to this dynamic next gen fighter makes every fight different testing and pushing all of the facets of my skills.

All proper challenges becomes easy when fully understood. It's that "ah ha" moment that people reach when learning anything. Once you "get it" it becomes funny to you when you consider how much trouble a challenge gave you.

I've also learned that some of the biggest challenges you'll face in a video game are re-learning something, overcoming your own mental barriers, and understanding how you learn within a learning environement. Learning is work as it is. But having to work to undo that work and still have to work at learning it the right way can be exhausting. It's amazing how people will find all the time in the world to do/learn something the wrong way yet struggle to do it the right way from the beginning.

I've learned that developing a high level of adaptation skill helps keep my ability to quickly learn sharp. The better you get at learning, the easier it is to learn the next thing.

With that said, I think it's important for every games writer or aspiring writer to understand at least one video game as thoroughly as possible and to becomes as good as possible at one game (preferably a multiplayer game).

As this blog continues to grow I understand more games more completely than I ever have before. By studying a game,which often requires revisitation, and writing essays, I'm able to understand the inner workings of a game on a much higher intellectual level. Understanding how each element of a game works together to build the whole experience also develops my ability to key in on all the non verbal methods video games use to communicate and teach. In other words, the more you understand a game the wider your critical-eye becomes.

By playing a video game at a high competitive level, I was forced in a way to look at game mechanics and the range of their function in a complete way. By going to that level, you will learn more about video games, yourself as a learner, and yourself as someone who is capable of doing anything. And doing/action is the thing that outraces words by a factor of a thousand.

Is That A Challenge?

For the remainder of this article, I'll be responding to the comments made on the podcast in bullet point format.

The "death mechanic" is an old gameplay convention: You get it wrong, you die, you go back, and you try it again: Dying in a video game is a natural/organic conclusion when a game centers around violent actions. In order for a game to be a game, there must be a goal. For this goal, there generally has to be a way to win and lose. Functionally, the "death mechanic" is analogous to many different kinds of losing even when the player doesn't die.

Death in games is designed to make money in arcades: Certainly all game's aren't design to steal our quarters. Even if the "death mechanic" was popularized in this way, arcade machines still aren't even close to slot machinesand their ability to steal money.

The difficulty of Mega Man 9 just "clicks" for certain people: Perhaps people who want a good challenge that can be significantly curbed by learning how the game works and adjusting the difficulty when necessary. In other words, MM9 is for the type of gamer that seeks a flexible learning environment where the learner is in control. I've noticed that many of the hardcore gamers on the internet and professional games enthusiasts have grown soft. Their complaints about Mega Man 9 and their inability to even beat the first set of bosses are alarming. I thought the hardcore gamer was supposed to have the skills to tackle games like Mega Man. I thought the hardcore gamer wanted their game's to be "hard." The fact that he adjustable difficulty in Mega Man 9 takes off the apparent "hard edge" makes me feel that anyone who is still having problems with the game needs to increase their skills, buckle down, and learn something about the game. That, or buy more E tanks.

The primary reason to play a game is not necessarily challenge anymore: This is true to an extent. Besides the challenge that inherently comes from establishing a goal within a game world, a lot of play exists where the player is free to noodle around without deliberately reaching the goal. However, just because gamers can play video games without looking for a challenge, doesn't mean that the challenge should or can be removed from the game. Go ahead, mess around in Super Mario Brothers. Don't try and beat the level. Eventually, the time will run out and if you keep that up, you'll lose all of your lives. There's nothing wrong with playing like this, of course. But I can't say that doing so brings the player closer to understanding Super Mario Brothers beyond the surface level.

Sometimes I feel that if you don't want to be challenged then you shouldn't play a video game. Goals are an inherent part of games. The mere existence of a goal that can't be reached with idleness means the player must do something to overcome the challenge. Whether the challenge is easy to you or incredibly difficult, it's still a challenge. So when the 1up crew describes not wanting to be challenge, I take it to mean that they don't want to work or learn to overcome an obstacle. In other words, they don't want to change, but they still want the game to appear/react as if they had.

Carrying the attitude of not wanting to learn/engage with a video game develops a gamer that wants fewer consequences in their experience. After all, with fewer consequences there are fewer ways to lose. When there's fewer ways to lose, the gamer grows less worried about failing. When there are less ways to fail, the challenges and goals in the game become simplified and/or the gamer will become satisfied with doing almost nothing. When gamers don't want to learn and would rather just "relax" and "zone out" when playing a game, the lack of engagement practically destroys the players ability to learn. After all, learning is active/interactive, not passive.

This notion that entertainment doesn't (or even shouldn't) engage the mind is ridiculous and probably stems from a world filled with sub par TV shows and other mediocre products of entertainment. It's easy to be "entertained" by a TV set. You turn it on and it seems to do all the rest of the work by itself. Learning is work even when it's fun. As soon as you get used to having fun or being entertained from passive experiences, it becomes easy to delude yourself into thinking that passiveness is just as good as being engaged in an activity. As soon as you prefer to turn your brain off, you've robbed yourself of the chance to develop something wonderful.

My fear with the gamer who gets used to passively playing games or is unwilling to learn is that they'll never reach higher, more complex, and richer game experiences. Garnett Lee described such an experience as a wonderful and delicious "gaming casserole." In other words, in order for the designers to empower the player with the ability understand and master the game world, the player must learn the mechanics and rules step by step. The only way to ensure the player has some level of understanding on a mechanic/concept is to test them. Games create tests by constructing challenges.Without challenge, without being engaged, and without learning the interactivity that sits at the heart of the video games medium is nothing.

We are gamers. We are learners. We seek challenges so we can better understand game worlds, ourselves, and the real world we live in. You might suck today. But with an open mind and a will to learn, you'll develop the skills and a critical-eye through which the world can be viewed.

16 comments:

I think anybody who sets out to critically study games is putting themselves in a dangerous position when it comes to objective judgements on the difficult of games, or the ability of others to successful learn their core mechanics.

You have actively pushed yourself to develop a level of knowledge of game mechanics and dynamics that puts you far above most gamers. The majority of people have never done that, is it fair to suggesting that they should in order to be engaged?

If we are looking to understand games critically then I understand your point. However Garnett Lee and the others at 1Up are ultimately not game critics they are games journalists, and reviewers. Their responsibility is not to the games themselves but to the consumers, the majority of who simply don’t have the time nor inclination (Regardless of what you think of that attitude) to devote to develop a critical understanding of games. They therefore have a responsibility to consider games from the perspective of somebody who might not have spent years developing the skills necessary to critically understand games.

A lack of desire to be critical does not automatically equate to a desire not to be engaged. I have only a little knowledge of the language of film, yet I found The Godfather to be a powerful and engaging experience, and I derive entertainment from other such experiences. However I find Mulholland Drive to be utterly impenetrable. I would have to devote far more time to developing my understanding of the language of film in order to even start to appreciate the work of David Lynch. I have to ask myself, if that is a worthwhile investment, and ultimately my answer is no. I can be engaged and entertained without spending that extra time so I have to incentive to do so.

Learning, though ultimately rewarding, can be difficult and time consuming, even when we are engaged in doing so. It’s a very difficult battle to try and convince somebody with limited time that they need to learn how to play a game in order to be entertained by it.

I think that there are some aspects to Mega Man that give it a "brutal" difficulty. The rules may be simple, but it's the level design that makes it hard. It has many "cheap" deaths, in which you can only live if you know what is coming. It also gives you no feedback or forgiveness if you are attacking a challenge the wrong way (like boss battles and level-order). Having to repeat a large chunk of the stage over and over really beats down the spirit. IMO, they should offer multiple paths with different rewards, or have difficulty levels that make minor adjustments to the level design (like additional platforms).

I would like to see Capcom try a Super Mario Bros approach, and make it easier to go from beginning to end, but transparently have more challenges/rewards for the hardcore.

I do agree with you in that passive games may hurt the gaming industry over time. Offering an easy mode can ruin a gaming experience. I played Call of Duty 4 first on easy difficulty because I just wanted to quickly see the story. On easy, all the carefully balanced design elements go out the window. It was a very boring experience that tainted my view of an amazing game. If developers do offer different levels of difficulty, they should explain what kind of experience should be expected from each.

I never suggested in the article that the average person/gamer should push themselves to develop a critical-eye. And I never implied that you can't be engaged with a game unless you're critiquing it and consciously breaking it down.

It's not a matter of having the time to devote to developing a critical understanding of a game. It's a matter of using the time you have more fully. Anyone who plays an RPG, for example, has time to spare in my opinion. With the amount of static space that runs rampant in JRPGs and similar games, I'm surprised people still try to argue that the average gamer doesn't have a lot of time. The bottom line is, people make time to do the things they want/need.

I didn't say that one had to be/want to be a critic in order to be engaged with a video game. I was simply noting a trend that I've noticed among different types of gamers in different gaming communities.

The moment you ask yourself "what are the controls?" or "what kind of game is this?" you've started the learning process. People learn everyday because learning is natural. I doubt your (or anyone's) enjoyment with a game will go very far if you don't learn the basics controls/objectives/rules of a game.

I don't have to try very hard to convince anyone of these points. The evidence is already here. It's in our (the gaming industry as a whole) buying patterns, gaming purchases, and other areas. We speak through our actions.

Learning and interactivity are inseparable. Don't confuse what I mean by the learning/active gamer with the critical-gamer. They are two different types of people.

The "cheap deaths" that you describe in Mega Man aren't nearly as cheap as you think.

1) You have the ability to adjust the difficulty by buying the spike shoes, using rush jet, using rush coil, etc.

2) Once you realize that the "cheap" sections have rules and patterns that are consistent, they just becomes one more thing to learn and look out for. How many times are you going to fall on some spikes before you learn to look at the scrolling stage in order to steer Mega Man to a safe section?

3)I looked at the level maps for the first 8 bosses and their stages, and I only found a few questionable areas that could be considered "cheap" death sections. And even in these cases, you don't have to memorize the set up, you just have to remember to be alert/look alive/and keep your eyes peeled. These are strategies that come in handy throughout the whole game.

4) You seem to also be underplaying the effectiveness of a good reflexes and adaptability.

5) There is no memorization necessary for Mega Man. This means you don't have to know what's coming to survive. The first time I played the game, I didn't have any problems on the vast majority of the "cheap" sections.

After the first time I was killed by the block that's actually a hole on Concrete Man's stage, I began looking at the game and the visual cues more carefully. The game teaches you how to look/dissect challenges through examples.

"It also gives you no feedback or forgiveness if you are attacking a challenge the wrong way (like boss battles and level-order)."

What's this wrong way you're talking about. You can beat close to 99% of the game with only MegaMan and his M. Buster. With the levels being so linear, how can you approach it the wrong way? There's only one way.

Just because the bosses have weaknesses, doesn't mean exploiting the weaknesses is the "right" way to beat them. My first play through MM9, I beat all the bosses without using their weaknesses. There's nothing wrong with wanting to/or having to play either way.

If you're getting your spirit beat down for repeating a part of a stage then you need to...

1) take a break2) take some time off from trying to beat a level and get more comfortable with the game's core mechanics3) start adjusting the game's difficulty by using power ups from the shop or special powers.

If you don't want to do these things, then there's nothing wrong with acknowledging that you don't have the skills at the moment to beat the level.

Even though the levels in MM9 are super linear, there are multiple paths that can make the game harder or easier. Rush Coil and Rush Jet can create new paths through a section. Furthermore, concrete shot and T.Blow also help with Mega Man's platforming abilities.

The more seriously you take Mega Man (and the less excuses you make for it) the more you'll see that there aren't any tricks you can't handle with ease. Once you start thinking in Mega Man mode, the game takes on a new level of cool.

My point was that anybody who has clearly invested the time in understanding games to the extent you have is probably ill positioned to judge the difficult curve of a game to those who haven’t invested such time.

You don't feel Mega Man 9 is brutally hard and want people to engage with their games but your somewhat unique position seems liable to make it difficult to assess the difficulty of the game to the average gamer.

When you understand a games mechanics it can be very difficult to appreciate how difficult they are for somebody else to learn.

I also wonder if you underestimate the challenge of execution for the average gamer.

The only way for the average gamer to reach the same level of understanding is by pushing themselves through to a state of mastery, something very time consuming. Of course they could use their time better but your argument that there is a lot of static space in which is time that could be better used doesn’t work for me as it assumes game mechanics are the sole reasons people play such titles. If I am engaged with the narrative or presentation then that is not time wasted for me.

If I don’t have the time or inclination to develop mastery of a game that doesn’t mean I am seeking passive entertainment or don’t want to be engaged. As I described with my references to The Godfather.

If I am in a position where I am writing about games, as a critic or as a journalist, then I should devote some time to developing that mastery. That is the what I felt the initial half of your post covered and what I was referencing in my initial comment.

What I’m saying is you are an above average gamer, who has taken the time to develop a critical understanding of game mechanics, that is going to affect your judgement when it comes to the apparent difficulty of a particular title.

And my point is, I've been doing this with games since I was 5 years old. It's not that my critical-eye skews my perspective on what it's like to be an "average gamer." I remember what it was like being a kid playing Mega Man on the NES and barely having the hand eye coordination to defeat Gemini man. Just like what I've suggested, I remember using rush jet/coil to make platforming sections easier on myself. I speak from experience.

In the initial stages of learning what a video game is and the nature of action reaction pairs, much time is consumed understanding. But I have to assume that anyone who's been playing video games for a number of years has pushed past this stage.

Learning is a process that's made even longer when you're on your own. When you don't have a teacher/class/comrade to interact with, it takes that much longer to get over snags and other learning hurtles.

But with a teacher and a structured environment, people can learn at a much faster rate. This is why I'm giving out free kicks in the pants. Because sometimes, you need a kick to the pants to shake off a learning funk you might be steeped in.

Yeah, I don't think Mega Man 9 is brutally hard or Calculus or gel electrophoresis for that matter. Once you truly learn the inner workings of anything, it becomes that much easier. Developing a working understanding of MM9's mechanics mostly involves paying close attention to what's going on in the game. And that's nothing special.

I know I'm giving a lot of credit to the average gamer. I'm doing this because, like with any kind of education, I don't believe that everyone is just average. With the right teacher, the right environment, and the right tools I believe that everyone can learn to do great things.

I don't underestimate people for this reason and because of how the human mind works. The more I understand the mechanics of the mind, the more I believe in the average person's ability to overcome "difficult" challenges.

The average gamer doesn't need to reach my level of understanding to "see the light." It's not about the ultimate level of understanding. It's about the next level. Everyone starts at different levels. And everyone has at least 1 more level they can aspire to. That's the goal.

Your comment about engaging with the story/presentation elements of a game isn't relevant. When talking about game difficulty, we're strictly taking about the game mechanics or other interactive elements of the game. You said that some gamers don't have the time to learn about a game, and I argued that everyone makes time when they want to.

I didn't say you had to master a game to be engaged with it. It seems that you're confusing a lot of different statements here.

Understanding game difficult as educational design is probably the best way of going about it. After all, it should be clear by now that difficulty is only relative.

We're all going to have differing opinions regarding the difficulty of Mega Man 9, but as someone who grew up playing them I found the demo to be so hard it forced me to reconsider buying the game. This was a painful decision to make because from the moment I heard there was a new-old Mega Man game, I was positively elated. Those damned elephants are extremely cruel - truth be told, the only reason I know there are three is because I read people complain about them online. I couldn't make it past the second one.

I'm not going to give up on Mega Man 9, for I trust there's a weapon that will make the elephants much more tolerable. But the fact that I never encountered a hurdle this high on any of the classic Mega Man games, that makes me agree with the major gaming sites that Mega Man 9 is *insert harsh adverb here* hard.

I don't know if you have already bought the game or if these options are available in the demo but...try any combination of...

1) Using an energy tank2) Using the laser trident from Splash woman.It cuts through all objects so the ball won't stop it from hitting the elephant. 3) If you have Hornet Man's power, that will work too.

If you don't want to do those try this.

1) The first elephant can be killed easily from the latter. Just climb up and shoot it until it dies.2) The second elephant mixes things up with it's green ball. If you're not bold enough to run under the ball when it first bounces, then hang out at the back of the screen and jump over it when it comes to you. Then just remember to jump back over it. All the while, gradually score some jump shots on the elephants face.3) For the 3rd elephant, just hang out on the center area and keep jumping to adjust your position. Remember, you have more leeway when jumping than you do when trying to adjust by walking.

In all these cases, get used to staying alive before you start shooting the elephants.

Practice taking every challenge one by one and ask your self, what do I need to do to not get hurt. Then figure out how to attack while surviving.

I know you can do it. It may frustrate you to replay the level after losing to the elephants, so it's important to visualize the wining strategy before going back and trying again.

I've also been bemused by the crowd saying Mega Man 9 is too hard. I encountered exactly two deaths that I would consider "cheap", and they are both in the anti-gravity sections of Dr. Wily's castle. Every other situation gave me enough visual cues to survive on the first try, so long as I was engaged and focused. Whenever I died, it was because I missed something, or didn't adapt quickly enough, never because of a fault in the level design.

Capcom put a lot of effort into providing tutorials for each new mechanic in the game. This is more true for MM9 than it has been for any Mega Man game since #2.

That first elephant is a lesson, not a serious opponent, just like the first fire-breathing dog in Wood Man's stage. He gives you all the information you need to beat elephant #3 and most of what you need to beat #2.

The same is true for the spikes in Galaxy Man's stage. The first time the screen scrolls up to reveal a bed of spikes under your feet, you've just completed a gauntlet of jumps over similar traps, and you should be pretty alert by then. In fact, the claw-bot had just hauled me against the extreme right wall at that point, and I was already holding the d-pad to the left in reaction to being bullied, so I was never in any danger of falling on the next bed of spikes.

I would actually call that bit of level design "psychologically perfect", rather than "cheap."

Almost everything in the game is like this, including the bosses. None of them have more than three simple attack patterns. So long as you have enough health to take a couple of hits at the start, you should be able to knuckle down and win, no matter whether you have the right weapon equipped or not. It feels more like a triumph of will, rather than skill or memorization.

All that being said, however, I did die a lot when I first started up the game, because I had to make an important mental shift.

Most modern action games do not require you to make significant changes to your tactics on the fly. Instead, you must find a comfortable playing rhythm and make small adjustments to it, based on new situations or play mechanics.

Mega Man 9 doesn't let you establish a single rhythm for the entire game. It relentlessly invades your personal space with new key changes and time patterns. In order to keep from constantly dying, you have to make yourself vulnerable to change. Real, conscious, in-the-moment change. It feels very similar to improvising a scene with a partner on stage (or a song with your band-mates, I imagine).

Once I made that shift from passive, habitual "gamer" to active participant, I simply stopped dying, unless my concentration lapsed. Of course, that still meant a lot of deaths, my concentration being what it is these days, but the improvement was dramatic.

The learning curve in MM9 is so ideal, I have to believe that the game's objective "difficulty level" is not the problem. Gamers like the 1UP staff are simply resistant to this method of learning. It seems disingenuous to me to attack the game for being "brutal", when it is already doing everything in its power to help you.

I think I may be repeating some of what kirbykid is saying here; but I'm just so pleased to see someone articulating my general feelings about this game, I have to add my two cents, even if it's redundant.

I think there is an inherent inertia involved in learning the mechanics of a game that can make it progressively more challenging to push back against them.

A lot of games require a different form of learning, or require different things to be learnt should I say, to Mega Man 9. So the more dissimilar games you play going into Mega Man 9 the steeper than slope between where you are and where you need to be; the more you have to push against that inertia. That kind of mental re-education can be frustrating and stressful. It can be very hard to appreciate the rewards you will gain from freeing yourself from that inertia. Because relearning is hard a lot of people will quit out of Mega Man 9 in frustration before they are able to mentally recondition themselves to the game.

Believe me, I know what you're saying, and I know where you're coming from.

Learning something the wrong way and having to relearn something can create some of the most difficult and frustrating experiences.

It seems like when you reference a "lot of games" you're speaking in generalities. In this case, I find it too hard to make such a case. Sure some games have learning systems that can be considered contrary to MM9' style. But does that mean there are more of them in the market? Does that mean the type of gamer who plays MM9 would have played those types of games more?

MM9 is the 9th in the series without counting the X games, Mega Man Zero games, and the ZX games. In all honesty, it's completely possible to be "well researched" on the type of learning in MM9. For the record, I think the type of learning in MM9 is very natural way to learn that is shared with some of the best Nintendo games. Consistent rules. And form fits function.

Furthermore, considering that other games can teach players in ways that make learning MM9 more difficult is kind of absurd. If any two games have contrary learning styles, then the lesson to learn is that you have to treat every game (and likewise every endeavor) individually. When you realize this, it becomes obvious that everything is different and when you do find similarities between them, they're true similarities that comply with a more universal learning system.

After all the fields and hobbies I have experience with, this is something that I've learned.

There are really no excuses. Just good teachers/learning systems, and the people that could really use them.

Updated Critical-Glossary

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Critical-Glossary

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Alphabetical

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abstract mechanic

Some gameplay mechanics are completely artificial, meaning they do not make logical sense based on the form of the game. When such mechanics are privileged within a game's design, we tend to label these games as being "arcade" like. I describe these gameplay mechanics as being abstract.

It is a design innovation that applies to games that are played in real time. By taking the progression of real time and breaking it down in specific contextual ways, a new level of game design can be reached. This is the essence of asynchronous time, or async.

In music, Counterpoint is the writing of musical lines that sound different on their own, but harmonize when played together. How the melody of a song interacts with the other lines is the focus of Counterpoint.

Counterpoint, in gaming, is a word for the way gameplay develops past optimization by layering interactive elements into a single gameplay experience. When each layer influcences, interacts, and enhances the functions/gameplay of each other layer the gameplay emerges into a medium of expression that reflects the individuality of a player and the dynamics that reflect the complexity of the world we live in.

A measure of how the changes in the method of input are paralleled with the action in the game according to the form of the mechanic. If you quickly press the green button on your controller, does the game quickly press the button on the screen? If you hold the button on your controller, is the button on the screen held down as well?

An measure of how the game world responds to the action. According to the form of the game world and the mechanic, does the world react realistically? What is the extent of the properties of the mechanic? Are the reactions to the mechanic special cases or can the resulting actions continue to effect the game world?

Like Marxist criticism, the most successful Feminist critique of a game involves analyzing how the range of player functions that affect female characters directly or indirectly reveal the operations of patriarchy. When the player is encouraged or forced to play in a way that depicts men as strong, rational, protective and women as weak, emotional, submissive, and nurturing, then the game can be said to support and reinforce patriarchal genders roles and ideologies. Patriarchal values work to oppress women, and all feminist theory and criticism works to promote women‘s equality. A Feminist analysis can become more complex when finding examples of actions toward women if a game doesn’t feature any women or the game allows for limited interaction with women. Writing essays about such games often leads to finding evidence by absence. In other words, a Feminist critic’s central piece of evidence may be what can’t be done to women instead of what can.

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flow

How a game accelerates or creates forward momentum. This factor of gameplay isn't necessarily about speed. More specifically, it looks at how a game's interactions feed back into the player's options/experience like a snowball rolling down hill.

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folded level design

Level design that resuses a space with the second use containing an extra layer to the gameplay that builds on the knowledge and experiences established on the first layer.

Form fits function is a powerful game design principle that has powered many of Nintendo's greatest games. Using familiar visuals, games can use their form to communicate to the player. If there is a ball resting on a tee and the player avatar has a golf club in their hands, they better be able to swing the club and hit the ball. Otherwise, why put such things in front of the player in the first place? Keeping the form true to the functions and limits of a game creates the cleanest most easily enjoyable experiences.

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function creates form

When a game's mechanics inspire, shape, and define the creation of ancillary parts of a game. ie. story, setting, premise, characters, music, audio

Interplay is the back and forth encouragement of player mechanics between any two elements in a game. Put simply, interplay is where actions and elements in a game aren't means to an end, but fluid opportunities that invite the player to play around with the changing situation.

A measure of the degree to which input method matches the form of the game. If there's a green button on the screen, and a green button on your game controller, the form of the game is liked to the input of pressing the green button on the controller.

Like Psychoanalytic criticism, Marxist criticism can seemingly critique a game by looking solely at a its fiction. However, both of these critical modes, in relation to videogames, achieve a deeper, more profound level of analysis when the elements of interactivity between the game and player are taken into consideration. Many Marxist critics of literature believe that film, literature, art, music, and other forms of entertainment such as videogames are the primary bearers of cultural ideologies. While we’re being entertaining by these medias, our defenses are lowered making us all the more susceptible to ideological programming. A Marxist critic of videogames looks for how a game supports or condems capitalist, imperialist, or classist values. Perhaps the best and most obvious place to look toward in games is the role and function of money. Some games represent money with actual U.S. dollars or some other form of real world currency. Others use fictional currency from bell, to gil, to star bits, or even points. What the player can purchase, how these items or services function, and how the money circulates within the game world all become important areas of analysis.

"New Classical criticism focuses on identifying a game's primary function/action that sums up all of the player's actions, functions, and abilities into a single expression. This expression can be thought of as the interpretation of the game or what the gamer is actually doing when he/she plays. Sometimes the primary function can be encapsulated in a single word. For example, the primary function of the Super Mario platforming series is "jump". After the primary function is identified, the New Classical critic then looks at a game's formal elements to analyze how they promote the primary function. The formal elements include Sound, Music, Art style, Story, Graphics, level design, enemies, etc. Because the New Classical critic privileges interactivity over passivity (especially when focused into a limited number of rules and actions), such a critic is only concerned with how these elements shape the gameplay experience, and assumes that any formal element in a game is only meaningful when it supports the primary function and exists in a lower state of priority to that function. In other words, elements like story can't be more stressed and more important to a game than the gameplay. Even if a game is designed according to the conventions and assumptions of Western game design, it can still be critiqued in the Classical mode."

A type of multi-fold level design where the creases and layers are so flexible and/or dynamic that considering the possibilities within a single level are interconnected and complex. Considering the shape created from a multi-fold level is similar to observing an origami figure.

For those who aren’t careful, a Psychoanalytic critique of a game appears to only be concerned with the fiction of a game and the relationship of the characters. Unless the game is Psychonauts, most games seem to have little to nothing to do with the human psyche. Neglecting how the game fiction and the gameplay (or game rules) come together to create the Psychological work in a game is a common pitfall. Another easy pitfall is to get wrapped up in Psychoanalyzing the developers of the game, or what may be infinitely more embarrassing, accidentally analyzing one’s own psychological state while trying to pass it off as an analysis of the game. Though it is true that the fiction of a game is an important part of any Psychoanalytic analysis, the gameplay is where the most profound sources of material because the interactivity of the game can influence and transform the player in more powerfully subtle ways than a passive medium.

The set of mechanics that do not make up the set of primary mechanics. These mechanics usually aid and help shape the primary mechanic.

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sections (sub-sections)

All games can be broken down into sub-sections or sections. Whether a game is broken down by rooms, loading sections, cut scenes, stages, levels, rounds, or turns, if a game has a mechanic that is repeated, then it can be divided into sections.

Structures are probably the most recognizable feature of videogames. Because structures create the foundation for the game rules and player to learn these rules, analyzing structure develops a clearer insight into how a game works at its core. We're all familiar with the structures of genre. Any gamer can instantly recognize a first person shooter like Halo from a puzzle game like Tetris. Each gaming genre has a certain look to it that is the result of the gameplay structures. Like with any genre, the degree to which the conventions are followed or deviated from varies greatly from game to game. Recognizing a game's structure is an acute way of talking about how a game works in or outside of its genre.

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suspension

In counterpoint, when a game element or game idea is offset form the established pattern of game ideas to create scenarios where the element/idea can carry over and influence other game ideas.

...about Critical-Gaming

We have come to a point where how we talk about video games is insufficient in expressing how we feel and think about them. With each year comes increasingly complex games, yet we are still, for the most part, writing and talking about games on a shallow consumer level.

It is time to start thinking and writing critically about games. However, before we can do this, we must approach gaming from a critical mode or mindset. To do this, we must first understand of how the different parts of a game work together (game design). Unfortunately, many of the who have experience in this area spend their time making video games. Beyond that, the body of knowledge that does exist is scattered at best. For this reason, it is hard for a thorough understanding of game design and critique to become widespread.

I have started this blog in efforts to inform both gamers and non-gamers of the complexities of gaming and how it compares to any other art form (music, literature, movies). Using literary critical theory and music theory as a starting point, I have developed a comprehensive set of critical modes for video game critique. By writing in these critical modes, and by critiquing other video game reviews, I hope to raise our understanding and expectations of video game journalism, critique, and even video games themselves.

We already have a loose idea of what it means to be a core gamer. A casual gamer. And a hardcore gamer. I hope with the right mindset, we can become critical-gamers, who don't shun our fellow gamers for thinking deeply about games but embrace the change we wish to see in the world.