Rob (![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} robyrt) wrote,@ 2008-07-14 11:08:00 |
|
Fun Skills and Not Fun Skills
Entertainment appeals to a subset of people determined by the skills it requires to consume. If you're not interested in developing / using that skill, you probably don't care about the item. (For example, Faulkner is "designed" to test your reading skill, while Eliot and Joyce test your education level.) Now, most media requires a very low skill level (TV comedies, for instance) so that they can reach to the broadest possible audience. But more ardent consumers tend to prefer more difficult material in their preferred medium/genre. TV shows with intricate plots and enormous cast lists like Lost or Heroes are quite popular, and Pokemon is a very durable brand precisely because it demands a higher level of familiarity than other products at that age group. Video games in particular are geared towards learning a skill, not using it like TV, books, music, etc. (It's possible are a to learn the music theory skill that classical music tests by listening to lots of Bach, but I wouldn't hold my breath.) I like to think of my own tastes as pretty cosmopolitan, but I also like to whine and criticize things I like. So an LJ post was inevitable.
Skill testing is only half the fun, though. The payoff needs to be something you also care about. With literature, the payoff is being able to fully enjoy "objectively" great books. With TV, the payoff is seeing the plot come to fruition.
Talking with Matt (my new roommate, for those just tuning in) about Devil May Cry 4, I realized that the key skill the game measures is not one he enjoys. "It's just a dumb game," he proclaimed, for two reasons: not a skill he cares about, and not a reward he cares about. In DMC4's case, the skill you develop is mastering a diverse and effective combat system, of learning how to control your character more effortlessly and imaginatively. The payoff is that you get to be the lead character in an over-the-top superhero anime. Halo has light elements of this (learning how to throw grenades or how to aim with various weapons), but the main skills it tests are aiming, twitch reaction, and tactical movement.
After reading the glowing, 110% reviews of Grand Theft Auto IV, I'm realizing that this is my problem with the game. I'm no good at navigation in real life (not that hot of a driver either) and learning how to get around a virtual city for me is both difficult and annoying, while the reviews praise it as the game's signature content. If the reward of a fascinating and very long storyline were worth it, I could power myself through these sections, but I am increasingly repelled by the story and my inability to make my character less repugnant.
Some things we are all willing to forgive. My brother Austin is willing to endure almost any level of gaming self-flagellation in order to get his reward; this is why he plays RPGs and MMOs, which typically compensate you with a fun storyline and increasingly useful characters as they go along. I am willing to endure near-total lack of rewards in order to develop my skills; this is why I play fighting games and rhythm games, where the joy is in the journey, as they say.
This little rant gives me a lot of hope that the games market is not as intellectually stagnant as it appears. There's a lot of room for an experience that tests a different skill in order to get the same reward than the established genre does it. Two great examples are The Sims and Mass Effect. The Sims asks of you a relatively unexplored skill (shepherding the AI) and gives you a very traditional reward (more loot for your character) combined with an appealing setting (dollhouse realistic fantasy). Mass Effect requires the skills of one genre (third-person shooting; the RPG elements of the game are practically automatic) and delivers the reward of a different genre (role-playing), to make an experience that's accessible to both parties.
Sidenote: I haven't bought World of Warcraft, although I feel its addictive pull. I was turned off it by two things: lack of a decent group to play with, and excessive downtime. The amount of downtime in WOW is less than other MMOs, but that's no excuse. I'm sitting down and resting after every few enemies, running for two minutes every time I die (which is often and semi-random), and spending several minutes just walking from one place to another when I'm done with one area, or looking for the spot to trigger the next quest. When I get back, I'm wrestling with a bad inventory system to earn cash. There are ways to bypass many of these annoyances, but they cost a lot of money (although slightly faster travel is mercifully cheap) and money is quite scarce. I don't know why they do it...
Entertainment appeals to a subset of people determined by the skills it requires to consume. If you're not interested in developing / using that skill, you probably don't care about the item. (For example, Faulkner is "designed" to test your reading skill, while Eliot and Joyce test your education level.) Now, most media requires a very low skill level (TV comedies, for instance) so that they can reach to the broadest possible audience. But more ardent consumers tend to prefer more difficult material in their preferred medium/genre. TV shows with intricate plots and enormous cast lists like Lost or Heroes are quite popular, and Pokemon is a very durable brand precisely because it demands a higher level of familiarity than other products at that age group. Video games in particular are geared towards learning a skill, not using it like TV, books, music, etc. (It's possible are a to learn the music theory skill that classical music tests by listening to lots of Bach, but I wouldn't hold my breath.) I like to think of my own tastes as pretty cosmopolitan, but I also like to whine and criticize things I like. So an LJ post was inevitable.
Skill testing is only half the fun, though. The payoff needs to be something you also care about. With literature, the payoff is being able to fully enjoy "objectively" great books. With TV, the payoff is seeing the plot come to fruition.
Talking with Matt (my new roommate, for those just tuning in) about Devil May Cry 4, I realized that the key skill the game measures is not one he enjoys. "It's just a dumb game," he proclaimed, for two reasons: not a skill he cares about, and not a reward he cares about. In DMC4's case, the skill you develop is mastering a diverse and effective combat system, of learning how to control your character more effortlessly and imaginatively. The payoff is that you get to be the lead character in an over-the-top superhero anime. Halo has light elements of this (learning how to throw grenades or how to aim with various weapons), but the main skills it tests are aiming, twitch reaction, and tactical movement.
After reading the glowing, 110% reviews of Grand Theft Auto IV, I'm realizing that this is my problem with the game. I'm no good at navigation in real life (not that hot of a driver either) and learning how to get around a virtual city for me is both difficult and annoying, while the reviews praise it as the game's signature content. If the reward of a fascinating and very long storyline were worth it, I could power myself through these sections, but I am increasingly repelled by the story and my inability to make my character less repugnant.
Some things we are all willing to forgive. My brother Austin is willing to endure almost any level of gaming self-flagellation in order to get his reward; this is why he plays RPGs and MMOs, which typically compensate you with a fun storyline and increasingly useful characters as they go along. I am willing to endure near-total lack of rewards in order to develop my skills; this is why I play fighting games and rhythm games, where the joy is in the journey, as they say.
This little rant gives me a lot of hope that the games market is not as intellectually stagnant as it appears. There's a lot of room for an experience that tests a different skill in order to get the same reward than the established genre does it. Two great examples are The Sims and Mass Effect. The Sims asks of you a relatively unexplored skill (shepherding the AI) and gives you a very traditional reward (more loot for your character) combined with an appealing setting (dollhouse realistic fantasy). Mass Effect requires the skills of one genre (third-person shooting; the RPG elements of the game are practically automatic) and delivers the reward of a different genre (role-playing), to make an experience that's accessible to both parties.
Sidenote: I haven't bought World of Warcraft, although I feel its addictive pull. I was turned off it by two things: lack of a decent group to play with, and excessive downtime. The amount of downtime in WOW is less than other MMOs, but that's no excuse. I'm sitting down and resting after every few enemies, running for two minutes every time I die (which is often and semi-random), and spending several minutes just walking from one place to another when I'm done with one area, or looking for the spot to trigger the next quest. When I get back, I'm wrestling with a bad inventory system to earn cash. There are ways to bypass many of these annoyances, but they cost a lot of money (although slightly faster travel is mercifully cheap) and money is quite scarce. I don't know why they do it...
