Well, thank you to the past few posters for proving my point about the disrespect many opinions receive. I'm not much of a Halo fan, I think I've played it a total of 5 times, but I don't believe playing Halo would make you a bad person.
Well, thank you to the past few posters for proving my point about the disrespect many opinions receive. I'm not much of a Halo fan, I think I've played it a total of 5 times, but I don't believe playing Halo would make you a bad person.
By arguing the fact that you’re a terrible person, you’re disrespecting my opinion.
We're not disrespecting your opinion, guy. Well, at least I'm not.
I'm disrespecting your doctrine. There's a huge difference.
I got too lazy to read that, but i wanted to post anyway
Or you look at reviews, sales figures and player-written reviews.Originally Posted by KING OF THE INTERNET
Which you know, is the sensible way to do it.
This is dealing with absolutism, and absolutism is a very frail argument for anything. There is a deep, inherent fallacy in saying that no game is good or bad simply because somebody SOMEWHERE might enjoy it. There is and will always be a natural arc of quality that can be agreed upon.i. No game is truly good or bad. It is nothing more than the opinion of a single person. In addition, everyone has their own opinion on what makes a game good or bad. Rather than trying to argue that a game is good, just accept that everyone has their own opinion and move on with your life.
ii. To anyone who still wishes to prove a game good or bad: Here’s what you do to prove this part of the document false. You take a poll of every person in the world on one video game. Every person must play the game and then tell you if they like it or not. If every person answers the poll the same way, then you have proven that there really is such a thing as a good or bad video game. Then of course, everytime a baby is born your poll is no longer accurate.
You are more than welcome to hide behind the defense of opinion, but I can present facts that can back up a statement.
Let's examine a hypothetical game. This game has a lot of spelling and grammatical mistakes, and the story line is absolutely nonexistent. I can say with some certainty, due to my expertise in the field of writing, that the game is poor in the areas of storyline, grammar, and spelling. You can attempt to refute it, but your argument is moot because you are fighting a losing battle. No matter how much you try to refute it, you WILL be wrong because the game IS what it is.
By this token, while there is a great deal of gray area in judging a game, there is still a certain level of quality that can be agreed upon as fact. People might dislike a game for any different reason, but just about every gamer can see the inherent flaws in any given game just as well as they can see the good points.
There is such a thing as a bad game. They do exist, I've played them, and I can say with some certainty that the game is, in fact, bad. Someone can refute it to their heart's content, but unless they can present factual evidence to debunk my extensive lists of reasons why the game itself is bad (which they would not be able to do due to the inherent lack of quality in the game itself).
First off, thanks to everyone for the criticism. I wish the other forums I posted this on would come up with arguments against it. I'm not perfect, and I know my post isn't either.
@Behold the Void: Thank you for your post, best so far.
You can present facts that show the grammar mistakes. That I cannot argue because if something is mispelled, then it is mispelled. However, whether or not that would actually make the game bad is again a matter of opinion.
You can also present "facts" to say the story is bad, but what if I hate reading anything in a game and the story is the last thing on my mind? If I don't care about the story or grammar then perhaps I'd find the game fun to play.
In that case, it would be your opinion that the game is bad because the story is nonexistant and the game is full of gramatical errors (kinda like my spelling job of that word) and it would be my opinion that the game is good because they don't trouble me with long sessions of "A pressing" to get through all the boring text so I am always actually playing the game.
As for presenting facts, the only one you have presented is about the grammar, and that cannot be debunked. But the fact that the grammar in this hypothetical game is horrible may not effect how much fun another person has playing it.
In order for that to be the same thing that I wrote, you would have to find a review written by everyone in the world instead.
Sales figures do not tell you if people liked the game or not. Perhaps the game had a lot of hype and millions bought it and didn't like it and returned it?
It's not the same thing because what you wrote was idiotic, simple as that.
SENSIBLE people, which really isn't you, define a game as good or bad by looking at sales figures, popularity, official reviews AND player reviews.
Regardless of hype and oversales, all three of those will give a definition of a game as good or bad, because you're looking at all the angles. In fact, most of all of the time, official and player-based reviews cover everything you need anyway.
You don't need to go ask everyone in the world, you're going to extremes to try and prove a point and quite badly failing at it.
And a "Doctrine of fun" is a complete oxymoron, you're setting up rules on how to have fun and if people play games to have fun then they should just PLAY the games, rather than fussing over pointless "rules".
I agree with Lindy on this matter.
I also never thought I'd say that.
It's disgusting, I know, but sometimes I'm actually logical.
While you may get a definition, that won't necessarily be accurate. If you base your opinion off of other people's opinions and sales data without ever actually playing the game then all you've done is take someone elses opinion and made it your own. What if, after forming an opinion based on reviews and sales data, you actually play the game and find that you love it?
And as I said in the message, this whole thing is a lot of common sense that people tend to ignore. I'm not creating any rules here, I'm making gamers aware of the rules that are already in place. This is simply "forgotten info". Gaming communities have turned into wars over Nintendo or Sony or Microsoft and when someone buys a game you hate then the "appropriate" thing to do is tell them they suck rather than respecting their opinion on what makes a video game fun to play. Fanboy is a word that is thrown around to mean idiot, spammer, and flamer and when people read that IGN gave a game a game under an 8 they immediately assume it sucks.
Thanks for that one Captain Obvious.
But I'd rather look at reviews, previews and other peoples thoughts of games before I go out and spend my money on one, because looking at something as wide as that WILL give an accurate view.
EDIT : Another thing I noticed that made me laugh.
Wait, what? Since when have their been RULES over how people think about games? There's never been anything like that, so don't try and think that you're bringing up something people should know and follow, because you're not. You're pulling something entirely pointless and wasteful out of your behind.
Last edited by Lindy; 11-02-2005 at 05:21 PM.
I don't care if you want to read a wall of text or not, there are still variables that can define a bad game from a good game. These include things such as:
Poorly executed plot that is either completely nonsensical, utterly cliche, just plain stupid, or a combination thereof.
Bad controls or play style. The hit detection is bad, the controls are unresponsive, the way the game is played is just plain stupid, etc.
These are two major points of a game that can factor into it being a bad game. Others can include hideously subpar graphics (for the time in which the game was made), terrible sound, poor mood setting, etc. etc. Usually it is a combination of these that constitutes a bad game.
To determine whether a game is or is not bad, you simply take the following factors.
Every variable that is, in fact, bad (I can prove these on a case-by-case basis). What the game is intended to do. For example, a game with a poor story that is mainly made to be a mindless shooting game can still be a good game. A game that is supposed to be a mindless shooting game with few weapon choices, bad hit detection, and wierd controls, however, is another case entirely.
Once the variables have been properly assessed, it is a simple matter to determine whether the game is, indeed, bad. One can also do this by looking at the reaction of gamers to the game. While there could be a percentage of gamers who enjoy the game, if the game is regarded as a bad game by a good percentage of gamers who gravitate towards several different styles (for example, if the FPS crowd dislikes an RPG it might not be a big thing, but if the RPG crowd dislikes it, it is another matter entirely), it is generally easily considered to be a bad game, especially after the variables and reasons as to why it is a bad game are brought into light.
Consequently, this is the basic outline of how most game review magazines and other such mediums judge games, and when done correctly it is VERY accurate.
I disagree with you on Fanboys or fanboyism. It is an objective thing. A fanboy is a person who can never see the bad side of their game(s) of choice. It's always the absolute best available, and the next one (if it's a series) will always surpass all other pretenders. I've dealt with them on several boards.
As to gameplay, it is somewhat objective.
For one thing, the controls should be fairly simple to understand. If there's a convention for the way the controls opperate, don't mess with them. If X is jump in every platformer out there, don't make O jump for yours. I have a game that does this, and I eventually gave up on it because I'd hit the wrong button when trying to jump. And for the interfaces, keep them simple and easy to understand. FF8 suffered because of a junctioning system that was tedious and complicated to set up.
For another thing puzzles should be logical in the context of the world. Don't make me do something that is supposed to make me die in that world. And don't make the puzzle depend on me knowing something that isn't common knowledge or that I'd have no way to find out by that point in the game.
Most of the rest depends on the game type.
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