I heard Yahtzee has been pissing a lot of people off.

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Wed Oct 07, 2009 6:22 pm

There's been an explosion in nerd rage directed at him lately.

I don't watch Zero Punctuation, I got a feeling of 'this guy has a bit of an ego on him' so it never caught on with me, but I love Internet drama. So could someone who watches his website tell me what's going on, please?

Same for VGCats, but in that case I do understand why Scott has experienced an influx in nerd rage. I think the hatred of him on his attitude towards casual gaming is unjustified (though I also think his opinion is dumb), but I do understand the rage at his lack of updates and Pokemon/Toilet humor obsession.

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Wed Oct 07, 2009 6:38 pm

I have no idea what his nerd rage is for right now...

He has been doing a little "Try out games I don't like" thing for a bit, and making fun of them. But really, that's what he does, it's not new.

As for VG cats, what's his opinion on casual gaming?

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Wed Oct 07, 2009 6:46 pm

Kaelik wrote:As for VG cats, what's his opinion on casual gaming?

Pretty much that casual gaming is the cancer that is killing gaming.

http://www.vgcats.com/comics/?strip_id=269
http://www.vgcats.com/comics/?strip_id=282
http://www.vgcats.com/comics/?strip_id=287

I don't agree with that perspective but I don't know why it pisses off casual gamers so much that he shows resentment towards it. I mean, we have things like Eternal Autumn and the breakdown of the anime community, why does Scott get singled out for a silly but Not-Particularly-Controversial-Opinion of 'things were better before the new guys came in and ruined everything!'

When I was still part of the TVTropes community the second strip in the batch caused a huge amount of nerdrage. Check out 'Dethroning Moment of Suck'. It might still be there.

Maxus · Post by **Maxus** » Wed Oct 07, 2009 6:57 pm

Lago PARANOIA wrote:
http://www.vgcats.com/comics/?strip_id=287

I actually agree with him on that one. At the university I attend, there's a "Video Gamer's Alliance," which is essentially the Halo Club.

The dudes are assholes, too.

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Wed Oct 07, 2009 7:21 pm

Well, I do agree about 'Ultimate Gamer' being a joke. It was pretty bad.

That said...

What kind of moron claims moral superiority for other people playing too easy games while he memorized cheat codes?

You use cheat codes! You are not better because you memorized cheat codes. You played an easy game too.

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Wed Oct 07, 2009 8:21 pm

Also, I have to say...

During the heyday of gaming, most of the games out-and-out sucked.

For every Metroid or Super Mario Bros. 3 you got three Cheetahmen. Things got better in the Super Nintendo era as bombs like Bebe's Kids and Shaq Fu were becoming more rare.

I would have to say that the current generation of videro james (at least on consoles) are pretty much the best generation yet. Honestly I haven't had a lot of OMG THIS IS SO FSCKING AWESOME moments in gaming between, oh, God of War and Super Mario 64. Except for Grandia II/Skies of Arcadia.

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Wed Oct 07, 2009 8:26 pm

I think that there's a real loss to the fact that a modern game costs sixty bucks and takes a hundred hours to play. It means that we don't see the volume of different games as we did when a 2600 title cost 2 bucks and you could play it until you were sick of it in a day.

Seriously. Jungle Hunt. That kind of Diamond-in-the-rough experience is simply impossible with how expensive, intricate, and time consuming games have become.

-Username17

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Wed Oct 07, 2009 8:49 pm

I agree Frank.

My brother is really good at finding those 'wow, this is way more fun than I thought' games that one guy programmed in his mom's sewing machine room. Bunch of weird but fun shit like trying to prevent a dinosaur by being taken out by a meteor shower or constructing a tower made of gelatin without it toppling over.

I am not, however, good at finding those games. I really wish there was a better mechanism for finding these diamonds.

Avoraciopoctules · Post by **Avoraciopoctules** » Wed Oct 07, 2009 9:30 pm

Lago PARANOIA wrote:I am not, however, good at finding those games. I really wish there was a better mechanism for finding these diamonds.

http://www.indiegames.com/

They've got a blog that highlights games that stand out.

Gelare · Post by **Gelare** » Wed Oct 07, 2009 9:45 pm

FrankTrollman wrote:I think that there's a real loss to the fact that a modern game costs sixty bucks and takes a hundred hours to play. It means that we don't see the volume of different games as we did when a 2600 title cost 2 bucks and you could play it until you were sick of it in a day.

Seriously. Jungle Hunt. That kind of Diamond-in-the-rough experience is simply impossible with how expensive, intricate, and time consuming games have become.

-Username17

I'm curious to see how downloadable games, like WiiWare and whatever they've got in that XBox Live Arcade, will affect that trend. I mean, I've heard good things about World of Goo, I'm led to understand that's a new game with innovative gameplay.

Crissa · Post by **Crissa** » Wed Oct 07, 2009 9:51 pm

Yeah, but all those games pre-existed the locked-in downloadable market like Live and WiiWare. Including World of Goo.

-Crissa

RandomCasualty2 · Post by **RandomCasualty2** » Wed Oct 07, 2009 10:16 pm

FrankTrollman wrote:I think that there's a real loss to the fact that a modern game costs sixty bucks and takes a hundred hours to play. It means that we don't see the volume of different games as we did when a 2600 title cost 2 bucks and you could play it until you were sick of it in a day.

Seriously. Jungle Hunt. That kind of Diamond-in-the-rough experience is simply impossible with how expensive, intricate, and time consuming games have become.

Yeah, it's mostly the fact that before you could seriously get a game programmed by one or two guys, and the only real cost to make it was producing the cartridges or floppy disks that it was distributed on. Now you need huge companies and teams of programmers to get anything done.

This really limits what kinds of games you'll see produced.

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Wed Oct 07, 2009 10:20 pm

But anyway, anyone have the dirt on Yahtzee?

PhoneLobster · Post by **PhoneLobster** » Wed Oct 07, 2009 10:58 pm

I dunno, dirt hey, I watch his stuff but do not frequent his forums.

He apparently fairly blatantly models his persona on Bender from Futurama?

Ganbare Gincun · Post by **Ganbare Gincun** » Wed Oct 07, 2009 11:04 pm

PhoneLobster wrote:I dunno, dirt hey, I watch his stuff but do not frequent his forums.

He apparently fairly blatantly models his persona on Bender from Futurama?

I don't know. I've never seen him bend any girders - or anything else for that matter - and he seems to be mostly devoid of booze, hookers, and blackjack. I don't think he steals much either, but I'm not Australian, so I haven't had the opportunity to have my pocket picked by him.

PhoneLobster · Post by **PhoneLobster** » Thu Oct 08, 2009 12:24 am

Ganbare Gincun wrote:and he seems to be mostly devoid of booze, hookers, and blackjack.

He goes on about them endlessly. Where have you been at?

On second thoughts, forget the blackjack.

Neeeek · Post by **Neeeek** » Thu Oct 08, 2009 2:30 am

Lago PARANOIA wrote:Also, I have to say...

During the heyday of gaming, most of the games out-and-out sucked.

For every Metroid or Super Mario Bros. 3 you got three Cheetahmen. Things got better in the Super Nintendo era as bombs like Bebe's Kids and Shaq Fu were becoming more rare.

It was worse pre-NES who enforced a licensing agreement to make games for their console that restricted a developer to 2 games a year (so developers need to sell a lot of copies of the 2 games they made, and therefore needed them to be good). You were lucky if you could find 1 remotely playable game out of 100 in the Atari 2600 days.

MGuy · Post by **MGuy** » Thu Oct 08, 2009 4:09 am

Neeeek wrote:
Lago PARANOIA wrote:Also, I have to say...

During the heyday of gaming, most of the games out-and-out sucked.

For every Metroid or Super Mario Bros. 3 you got three Cheetahmen. Things got better in the Super Nintendo era as bombs like Bebe's Kids and Shaq Fu were becoming more rare.
It was worse pre-NES who enforced a licensing agreement to make games for their console that restricted a developer to 2 games a year (so developers need to sell a lot of copies of the 2 games they made, and therefore needed them to be good). You were lucky if you could find 1 remotely playable game out of 100 in the Atari 2600 days.

I agree with Neeeek. There were a lot of bad games in the old days but mostly only the good ones got any publicity. As the market expands you got any and everything getting advertised well before it hits thee shelves whether it is actually good or not.

Josh_Kablack · Post by **Josh_Kablack** » Thu Oct 08, 2009 4:47 am

Frank wrote: I think that there's a real loss to the fact that a modern game costs sixty bucks and takes a hundred hours to play. It means that we don't see the volume of different games as we did when a 2600 title cost 2 bucks and you could play it until you were sick of it in a day.

Seriously. Jungle Hunt. That kind of Diamond-in-the-rough experience is simply impossible with how expensive, intricate, and time consuming games have become.

If you are solely talking console games, I agree.

But you're conveniently ignoring web based games, mobile device games and the many niche shareware companies out there. Those games have small enough production costs for at least some companies to take risks and deliver real variety

Lago PARANOIA wrote:
My brother is really good at finding those 'wow, this is way more fun than I thought' games that one guy programmed in his mom's sewing machine room.

Plug Time

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Thu Oct 08, 2009 5:42 am

My guess as to the rage against him is similar to that against Maddox:

If they're funny because they're scathing and insulting, it's hilarious until they target YOU.

So if Yahtzee insults Halo-style games, most people cheer. If he then turns around and bashes, say, fightan games, suddenly most of the fightan gamers get butthurt. Except for those who realise it's the Internet, thus not serious business.

Crissa · Post by **Crissa** » Thu Oct 08, 2009 6:55 am

Personally, I know I like weird games. And I know that Halo fans and Football players are hardcore gamers. They may not be as cerebral as past fans, but...

I'm okay with that. I'm more peeved that somehow because a market is not as large, it's "not worth" doing.

-Crissa

Murtak · Post by **Murtak** » Thu Oct 08, 2009 7:10 am

Modern games are the McDonalds of computer games. Most of them don't suck, but they don't do anything new and as a result none of them are great either. Of course, given that nearly all of them happen to be 3D polygon games with mostly handcrafted models, worlds and textures and are getting more detailed by the minute - well, when building your world takes a team of 60 the better part of a year I can understand being a little hesitant about trying anything new.

Of course there are other approaches. Some danish guy built a MMOG by himself. The entire world is procedurally generated, so that part is done, leaving him free to concentrate on the game itself. I think that will have to be the way future games are developed. I doubt the traditional way of handcrafting worlds is sustainable. One more doubling of resolution and polygon count and we are up to multiple years to build the world for a single game.

If you want to try the game it you can find it here. Be warned, the graphics a unconventional (and that damn flickering will most likely end up with me not playing a game that otherwise looks awesome).

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Thu Oct 08, 2009 7:22 am

Modern games are the McDonalds of computer games. Most of them don't suck, but they don't do anything new and as a result none of them are great either.

I disagree with that heavily, at least as far as console games go. Most of the good NES and SNES games were platformers (either Mario-style or Metroidvania) or jRPGs.

I'm not saying that they're bad, far from it, I just don't think that console games started breaking the formula until around the Fifth Generation; this was when processing power got strong enough to give us things like REAL first-person shooters, action-RPGs, flight simulators, and so-on.

For example, In the NES (3rd Gen) era, Mario, Ninja Gaiden, Metroid, and Legend of Zelda 2 don't play all that differently from each other. Nowadays they stretch the definition of 'Platformer' as far as it will go and play waaaay differently from one another.

Maxus · Post by **Maxus** » Thu Oct 08, 2009 7:32 am

Crissa wrote:Personally, I know I like weird games. And I know that Halo fans and Football players are hardcore gamers. They may not be as cerebral as past fans, but...

I'm okay with that. I'm more peeved that somehow because a market is not as large, it's "not worth" doing.

-Crissa

My problem with a noticeable segment of the Halo and Sports populations is they don't appreciate other stuff that's different, no matter how good it is.

The first time I saw Super Paper Mario played, it was by the guys I mentioned earlier. I know the Paper Mario dialogue tends to be worth reading, but the guy playing was boredly skipping through it as fast as he could. And it was a part (that big flying sanddragon boss) where, as fast as I read, I could tell some funny shit was being said, but couldn't get it all.

Likewise, I've seen Halo fans go into nerdrage over Metroid Prime's control scheme, because they have a hard time adjusting to the free-aim controls. One of them bragged how he sold the game for five bucks. I mean, I can understand if it throws them off at first and that's indeed irritating, but if they'd play more than Halo their muscle memory wouldn't be such a bitch to retrain.

Then again, I've always played a variety of games, so I tend to adjust to playing something different quickly enough.

Edit: clarified a lapse of attention.

Leress · Post by **Leress** » Thu Oct 08, 2009 7:37 am

Murtak wrote:Modern games are the McDonalds of computer games. Most of them don't suck, but they don't do anything new and as a result none of them are great either.

Doing something new doesn't mean that it is going to be good. *Looks at Mirror's Edge*

Also I can think of a number of games that do something new
-Scribblenauts/Drawn to life/Magic Pengel
-Contact
-Flower
-Lost Winds