Games require your participation. This is known. But what are the stakes of that participation? At what point does your investment become complicity? Playing a videogame is a partnership in meaning-making, but how do you know when you can trust that partner? How would you even recognize a con? Consider the playing of games within broader games culture. Is the relationship not mutual, generative, contagious? Before even getting into the metaphysics of the virtual. At what point are you not just collaborating with a videogame, and with games culture, but are yourself a full-on collaborator?

A con relies on skeptics as much as the faithful. Those who remain just suspicious enough, just aware enough to convince themselves they’re not being conned. Even as they go along with it. You tell yourself: I see what’s going on here, I see the faults, I’m no fool. Even as you mount your internal defenses, justify your actions, and play along. Do this long enough and you become the best mark of all. The mark who thinks they’re in control, who can quit anytime. Complete self-deception comes from thinking you’re un-con-able. Sure, you might have a modicum of self-awareness. Just not enough to make a difference.

- Tevis Thompson

Huh.

And here I thought I was just playing a fun video game. Silly me!

Today in 'Cody sucks the joy out of everything'...

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If that writer, I should say. His/her head is planted deep up his/her own ass, IMO. Utterly devoid of self reflection or self-ownership. The kind of person who will spend 20-30 hours playing a game and “hating every minute of it” just so they can turn around and trash the game with extra vitriol (like, how about you just stop playing?). Uses writing about video games as an excuse to dump on everything that commits the sin of being both “male” and “white”, as is all too fashionable, all without saying anything of actual depth or substance or worth.

Basically just a self-entitled downer, IMO.

First of all the argument is much more sophisticated than “male” and “white” is bad.

I see almost every movie that comes out. That includes bad ones. I’m in the business of understanding movies. You can learn a lot about them by seeing the bad ones. He seeks to understand games. That means playing and analyzing the bad ones. You might as well complain to Ebert to turn of a film he hates.

I’ve not played Red Dead 2 and I never will. I can’t really evaluate his arguments. But I have played Destiny. And I was the perfect mark for its con.

But I have played Destiny. And I was the perfect mark for its con.

Ok, I'm kind of bored today, so I'll bite.

What is the con for which you were the mark?

He kicked and screamed about how investment systems are bad for games.

Played Destiny anyway.

Swears he'll stop playing. Never does.

Is...bitter? Satisfied? Who knows? Everybody.

If that writer, I should say. His/her head is planted deep up his/her own ass, IMO. Utterly devoid of self reflection or self-ownership. The kind of person who will spend 20-30 hours playing a game and “hating every minute of it” just so they can turn around and trash the game with extra vitriol (like, how about you just stop playing?). Uses writing about video games as an excuse to dump on everything that commits the sin of being both “male” and “white”, as is all too fashionable, all without saying anything of actual depth or substance or worth.

Basically just a self-entitled downer, IMO.

Saving Zelda

I had a pretty emotional response to playing Breath Of The Wild because of it.

I think I've finally found the love for Breath of the Wild that everyone else had. It's my current obsession.

I always thought it was good, but I never understand why so many people said it's the best game of all time. I played it for like fifteen hours or so a few months after it came out, and I've played probably five since then, in little bursts here and there. It never sucked me in. I enjoyed it, but it felt lacking in substance in a lot of ways.

I still think that. I'd love to play a version of Breath of the Wild that has a world that feels as fully realized as The Witcher 3's. There's a serious lack of truly interesting stories.

I've been playing it a lot over the last few days (I put probably ten hours in over the weekend, starting over from a new save), and, having let go of my desire for more interesting characters and stories, I've started to really find a joy in just wondering around, with no goals beyond "get to the top of that mountain and see what's in the valley on the other side."

The scale of the world in that game still feels like magic to me. You can see for what feels like miles. The next hilltop always seems like it's incredibly close, but once you get in the valley between the two hills, it feels like that valley suddenly and magically expands to be huge. What looks like a small copse of trees from a hilltop becomes a quite large forest once you actually get there. It really does feel magical, and it's absolutely incredible.

I will always love The Witcher 3's world for it's attention to detail and it's sense of being a real place. I've never seen anything like it. The Breath of the Wild's world is on the other end of that spectrum, in that it feels impossible and magic. The use of sightlines in that game is like nothing I've ever seen before. No matter where you are, there's always some landmark visible, so you always know where you are. It must have taken a monumental effort to make that world feel like it does. I still wish there was more stuff to actually do in that world, stuff that felt important, rather than always simply moving rocks around to get another Korok seed, but that world itself is incredible enough that simply exploring it is an amazing experience that is its own reward.

If that writer, I should say. His/her head is planted deep up his/her own ass, IMO. Utterly devoid of self reflection or self-ownership. The kind of person who will spend 20-30 hours playing a game and “hating every minute of it” just so they can turn around and trash the game with extra vitriol (like, how about you just stop playing?). Uses writing about video games as an excuse to dump on everything that commits the sin of being both “male” and “white”, as is all too fashionable, all without saying anything of actual depth or substance or worth.

Basically just a self-entitled downer, IMO.

Saving Zelda

I had a pretty emotional response to playing Breath Of The Wild because of it.

If that article were written as a post here on DBO, it would get raked over the coals for the grandiose hyberboli combined with opinions presented as facts. It is very clear to me that the writer’s opinions are shaped as much by nostalgia as by the actual games being discussed. The way he describes The Legend of Zelda is utterly detached from reality. It was one of the better games of its time, when the medium was so limited that hardly anything was possible. And for those of us who were 4-7 years old when it came out, it was captivating. But it is not the holy grail of video games that this writer makes it out to be. Nor is it vastly superior to the subsequent Zelda titles that the writer trashes. He was just older when he played Ocarina of Time, and therefore the game’s mechanistic underpinnings were more detectable for him.

To be frank, most games from that era are vastly inferior to the average game today. There is a niche, nostalgia-driven market based around vintage video games, but if those games really were as good as writers like this make them put to be, then kids today would be playing them instead of Mario Maker, Pokémon, Fortnight, or Minecraft. They were great in their day, but they are far less great TODAY

This isn’t to say that none of his points are valid. There are significant differences between those older Zeldas and the direction that the franchise went over time. It’s the axiomatic position that “original Zelda = good, all other Zelda = bad” that I take issue with. His argument is an emotional one, but he refuses to recognize it as such. Other Zelda games don’t don’t make him feel the way that the original did. And that’s perfectly valid. For me, Ocarina of Time was that game. The level of detail and atmosphere that they achieved in the world was unlike anything I’d experienced at that point. The artistry with which it was all realized was gorgeous. I was absolutely captivated and enthralled. But I’m not going to sit here and ramble on about how every Zelda since then is garbage, because none of them made me feel the same way. It was a wonderful game for its time, and I was just the right age when I played it. For other people, that game might be Super Mario 3, or The Witcher, or Horizon Zero Dawn.

I think there are a lot of great points in this piece about the spirit of the original Zelda, and how Breath of the Wild is in many ways a return to that spirit. Personally, I think it would be a far better piece if he’d left out all the aggrandizement, rose-tinted glasses, and opinions presented as facts.

I want opinions. Tevis' opinions are often insightful and thought provoking. The whole point of reading critics is to read opinions.

I think this episode of sequelitis makes much the same point, but in a funnier way:

On principle I think it's hard to argue against. Just realize that nostalgia can tilt your views the other way making Ocarina your favorite.

We've seen the animated originals. So we scoff at the live action remakes Disney is putting out. But what of a child who sees Emma Watson as Belle for the first time? Might that be magical? Might they believe that version is superior? Possibly. It's funny Bioware mentioned Bob Dylan because nobody from gen Y or Z cares about him. They are clouded by nostalgia just like you are.

I went to a screening of Not Fade Away years ago and there was a Q&A with the cast and crew. A character in the film asks "There are two great forces in the world. Nuclear Weapons and Rock & Roll. Which will win out?" I asked David Chase how he could even ask that question when it was pretty clear Rock & Roll was dead. He said a lot of stuff and even called me a stupid millennial, but for his truth in his world Rock and Roll was still alive. To people like me in our world it certainly is not.

Everyone is influenced by nostalgia.

To deny that modern games have lost desirable elements from old games is simply wrong. But to deny that modern games do not have advantages is also simply wrong.

Of course the exception is Deus Ex. There will likely never be a better game :-p

I want opinions. Tevis' opinions are often insightful and thought provoking. The whole point of reading critics is to read opinions.

I think this episode of sequelitis makes much the same point, but in a funnier way:

On principle I think it's hard to argue against. Just realize that nostalgia can tilt your views the other way making Ocarina your favorite.

We've seen the animated originals. So we scoff at the live action remakes Disney is putting out. But what of a child who sees Emma Watson as Belle for the first time? Might that be magical? Might they believe that version is superior? Possibly. It's funny Bioware mentioned Bob Dylan because nobody from gen Y or Z cares about him. They are clouded by nostalgia just like you are.

I went to a screening of Not Fade Away years ago and there was a Q&A with the cast and crew. A character in the film asks "There are two great forces in the world. Nuclear Weapons and Rock & Roll. Which will win out?" I asked David Chase how he could even ask that question when it was pretty clear Rock & Roll was dead. He said a lot of stuff and even called me a stupid millennial, but for his truth in his world Rock and Roll was still alive. To people like me in our world it certainly is not.

Everyone is influenced by nostalgia.

To deny that modern games have lost desirable elements from old games is simply wrong. But to deny that modern games do not have advantages is also simply wrong.

Of course the exception is Deus Ex. There will likely never be a better game :-p

Part of my entire point is that we’re all effected by nostalgia. However, some people are unable to separate their own feelings from facts. I like music from the 80s more than any other decade. I have various reasons for that. Some subjective, others more objective (or at least observable). I could tell you all about why I feel the way I do. But I’m not going to say “80s music is the best and everything else is crap”, because that’s a stupid thing to say.

I’m interested in opinions as well. But when people can’t or won’t distinguish between their own opinions and facts, that tells me something about their thinking. Specifically, they are usually haven’t thought things through properly. Or better said, they CAN’T think things through clearly, because they can’t tell the difference between their own opinions and facts.

I’m interested in opinions as well. But when people can’t or won’t distinguish between their own opinions and facts, that tells me something about their thinking. Specifically, they are usually haven’t thought things through properly. Or better said, they CAN’T think things through clearly, because they can’t tell the difference between their own opinions and facts.

Is it really that hard? Here's how to tell if something is someone's opinion:

Is it a referential statement to an event that actually occurred? Is it in quotation marks? If the answer to both is no, it's their opinion. As far as I could tell, there were few facts at all in Saving Zelda save for release dates and things like that.

Late in the original Zelda’s second quest, I got stuck.

Fact.

That is what I’m claiming: that modern Zeldas are broken at their core.

Opinion.

Why is this only clear to me?

I’m interested in opinions as well. But when people can’t or won’t distinguish between their own opinions and facts, that tells me something about their thinking. Specifically, they are usually haven’t thought things through properly. Or better said, they CAN’T think things through clearly, because they can’t tell the difference between their own opinions and facts.

Is it really that hard? Here's how to tell if something is someone's opinion:

Is it a referential statement to an events that actually occurred? Is it in quotation marks? If the answer to both is no, it's their opinion. As far as I could tell, there were few facts at all in Saving Zelda save for release dates and things like that.

Late in the original Zelda’s second quest, I got stuck.

Fact.

That is what I’m claiming: that modern Zeldas are broken at their core.

Opinion.

Why is this only clear to me?

Because you cherry picked an example out of an article filled with other statements that don’t support your argument. He also makes statements like “Ocarina of time isn’t the best game of its generation (it isn’t even a good Zelda game)”. Presented as fact, and the whole article hinges on that premis, but it it 100% pure opinion.

The main issue is not whether I, the reader, can spot the difference between facts and opinions in the article. The issue is can the writer tell the difference between facts and his own opinions. And based on this article and others, I don’t think he can. There seems to be zero recognition of the role that nostalgia plays into his opinions, and the problem with that is nostalgia has as much to do with the person as it does with the game being discussed. He’s not taking into account his state of mind or point of reference when gushing over The Legend of Zelda. There’s zero awareness presented that he’s aware of the fact that HE changed just as much, if not more so, than Zelda has.

That’s a common problem with these “they don’t make them like they used to” pieces. People often forget to account for the fact that they played these old games when they were kids, life was relatively carefree, and they were in touch with their imagination to a greater degree than the average adult.

Again, there are plenty of good and interesting points in that article. All the comparisons in design philosophy between TLoZ and BotW are welcome and interesting. It’s the self-important, overblown agrandizing of his own opinions that drag the piece down for me.

I’m interested in opinions as well. But when people can’t or won’t distinguish between their own opinions and facts, that tells me something about their thinking. Specifically, they are usually haven’t thought things through properly. Or better said, they CAN’T think things through clearly, because they can’t tell the difference between their own opinions and facts.

Is it really that hard? Here's how to tell if something is someone's opinion:

Is it a referential statement to an event that actually occurred? Is it in quotation marks? If the answer to both is no, it's their opinion. As far as I could tell, there were few facts at all in Saving Zelda save for release dates and things like that.

Late in the original Zelda’s second quest, I got stuck.

Fact.

That is what I’m claiming: that modern Zeldas are broken at their core.

Opinion.

Why is this only clear to me?

Yeah I was going to ask, where did we get confused about stated fact vs opinion? It sounds like they make some hardcore value judgements, but ultimately they're stated as opinion and not as a fact. You just think they have a bad opinion, and that's like your opinion man.

I’m interested in opinions as well. But when people can’t or won’t distinguish between their own opinions and facts, that tells me something about their thinking. Specifically, they are usually haven’t thought things through properly. Or better said, they CAN’T think things through clearly, because they can’t tell the difference between their own opinions and facts.

Is it really that hard? Here's how to tell if something is someone's opinion:

Is it a referential statement to an event that actually occurred? Is it in quotation marks? If the answer to both is no, it's their opinion. As far as I could tell, there were few facts at all in Saving Zelda save for release dates and things like that.

Late in the original Zelda’s second quest, I got stuck.

Fact.

That is what I’m claiming: that modern Zeldas are broken at their core.

Opinion.

Why is this only clear to me?

Yeah I was going to ask, where did we get confused about stated fact vs opinion? It sounds like they make some hardcore value judgements, but ultimately they're stated as opinion and not as a fact. You just think they have a bad opinion, and that's like your opinion man.

I have no problem with his opinions. But if you’re going to call an article “Saving Zelda”, shouldn’t you at least justify the claim that Zelda needs saving? As far as the writer is concerned, Zelda needs saving because he doesn’t like it anymore, and his opinion is all that matters. If that isn’t a sign of self-absorbed thinking, I don’t know what is.

I’m interested in opinions as well. But when people can’t or won’t distinguish between their own opinions and facts, that tells me something about their thinking. Specifically, they are usually haven’t thought things through properly. Or better said, they CAN’T think things through clearly, because they can’t tell the difference between their own opinions and facts.

Is it really that hard? Here's how to tell if something is someone's opinion:

Is it a referential statement to an event that actually occurred? Is it in quotation marks? If the answer to both is no, it's their opinion. As far as I could tell, there were few facts at all in Saving Zelda save for release dates and things like that.

Late in the original Zelda’s second quest, I got stuck.

Fact.

That is what I’m claiming: that modern Zeldas are broken at their core.

Opinion.

Why is this only clear to me?

Yeah I was going to ask, where did we get confused about stated fact vs opinion? It sounds like they make some hardcore value judgements, but ultimately they're stated as opinion and not as a fact. You just think they have a bad opinion, and that's like your opinion man.

I have no problem with his opinions. But if you’re going to call an article “Saving Zelda”, shouldn’t you at least justify the claim that Zelda needs saving? As far as the writer is concerned, Zelda needs saving because he doesn’t like it anymore, and his opinion is all that matters. If that isn’t a sign of self-absorbed thinking, I don’t know what is.

If you didn't feel like Zelda needed to be saved, that's all well and good. When I read the article back when it was published, I felt like Zelda should be saved and so I didn't really balk at the assertion. As they laid out what they felt was missing from Zelda, it clarified a vague dissatisfaction I had with where the Zelda games had gone. Reading through it again, they make a case for why Zelda needs to be saved, an opinionated case, but a case nonetheless. Not sure why the title would have to be changed, especially since it's a fun double entendre.

And reflecting on it now, after BOTW came out, I think they're even more right than I thought they were back then.

The promise being: a world, vast, spread out before you, ripe for exploration, free. But when was the last time Zelda truly offered this? When the game plopped you in an open field and said: here is a world – have at it.

I strongly doubt this is actually true, but I feel like BOTW was a response to this article...

You’re all correct.

He’s clearly arguing his opinion. As usual, the problem is one of presentation. He’s arguing his opinion, but he sounds like a sanctimonious dickhole as he does it, like he’s talking down to anyone else who likes modern Zelda.

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