Ian Bogost. Edmunds Dev Blog for gay nerds. Opinion: Love, It's Working - Meaning And Action In Games. [In this editorial, Gamasutra's Christian Nutt looks at the way games use interaction and escapism -- with real-world parallels -- to see what actions can be meaningful, and what kinds drill down to meaningless button-presses.] I just got back from Ikea. I hate going to Ikea. I hate it because the store's design is intentionally obstructive to navigation, and because, inevitably, it's very crowded. I'm going to assume that the majority of readers, no matter what country they hail from, have been in an Ikea.
It's a European chain that's huge in the U.S., and there's one right outside Tokyo. If not, the short of it is this. If you make it through that maze, you're rewarded with the self-serve furniture warehouse and the checkouts -- and the exit of the dungeon. I'm not the only person who has thought about Ikea this way, it turns out. Like any video game, Ikea has its secrets. I think about Ikea this way because I've been playing video games since I was a small child. People as Obstacles No. Just Another World: Crackdown 2 « Save the Robot. In my column You Build Worlds, I talk up the importance of a well-made world by slagging a game that doesn’t have one: Crackdown 2. Why did I pick on Crackdown 2? Because it’s a shallow, silly, slim-budget knock-off of its predecessor. At the same time, it’s also a hoot—a fun, raucous game that I keep coming back to again and again, namely, every time I’m filled with rage and want to blow stuff up.
I can’t stop mocking it, but I can’t stop playing it, either. So with this game in mind, let’s consider: Is a believable world as important as creating fun and challenging gameplay? Crackdown 2 takes place in Pacific City, a metropolis that’s going down in ruins and flames. But there’s a fourth group in play here, and that’s the Civilians. Crackdown 2 does not get it right. This begs a question: why are they here? Why are they so dumb? The other sides don’t add up either. All of this is played out against a large but weirdly empty city. But let’s go back to the premise. Like this: Sexy Videogameland. Versus CluClu Land. Fullbright. The GAME OVERTHINKER. Press Pause to Reflect. Shawn Elliott. WIL WHEATON dot NET: 1.5. Applied Game Design.
The Brainy Gamer. The term 'genre' eventually becomes pejorative because you're referring to something that's so codified and ritualized it ceases to have the power and meaning it had when it first started. --Christopher Nolan Here's what we think we know about genre: it limits creativity. It binds artists to tried-and-true formulas and encourages derivative work. A creator must be free to follow her muse, unhindered by prescriptive rules. An artist working on a genre-bound project is like a caged bird.
She can sing pretty songs, but don't expect her to go anywhere interesting. Genres are agents of ideological closure; they limit the meaning-potential of a given text. Artists aren't the only victims. Some artists try hard to avoid genre influences on their work. So it's worth asking: what artist worth his salt would self-impose such constraints? My name is John Ford, and I make Westerns. Artists crave freedom, but most quickly learn that limits, even apparently harsh ones, can be more friend than enemy. Critical Distance. Trent Polack's Polycat.net. Lost Garden. The Behemoth Development Blog. Gaffer on Games. News Games: Georgia Tech Journalism & Games Project. While !Finished. Quinns.