Not only that but nowadays when you emulate, say a game for the NES, there
are save states so even if you died and would normally have started at the
beginning you could just load the save state and be right back where you
died.
They're coming to take me away, ha-haaa!
----- Original Message -----
From: "Thomas Ward" <[email protected]>
To: "Gamers Discussion list" <[email protected]>
Sent: Sunday, November 27, 2011 11:22 AM
Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Game Difficulty was RE: swamp
Hi Ryan,
That makes a lot of sense. You are right that the great games of the
80's and 90's really fostered an attitude of "get better or go home."
I can remember spending countless ours at the arcade right next door
to I.G.A. playing the arcade games with my friends. We would go
through an entire roll of quarters playing Donkey Kong, Zaxxon,
Packman, Super Mario Brothers, Double Dragon, TMNT, whatever was the
hottest game at the time. Thing was standing shoulder to shoulder with
your friends playing games encurraged a spirit of challenge,
competetiveness, and a desire to win no matter how many times you
whiped out x number of levels into the game. I don't remember anyone
complaining about having to start over from scratch, because that's
just how it was. I guess we just accepted it as a fact of life.
Now days this generation of gamers are use to automatic checkpoints or
quick saves so if they die a minute later he or she can continue
practically from where they left off. Since they never grew up on the
80's arcade machines like I did they don't have the same desire for
challenge and determination to keep playing the game as many times as
it takes to beat it. As you say I think the games have suffered as a
result because the industry has spoiled gamers with an attitude that
if you die in the game just reload your saved checkpoint and go on.
Too me that defeats the challenge and excitement that was present in
so many games from the 80's and 90's.
I remember when I was working on Montezuma's Revenge a couple of
people complained about being sent back to the beginning of the level.
I was a little surprised about them making a big deal of it because
that's the way all of the great arcade games from the 80's were. If
you lost a life the level reset and you started at the beginning of
the level with two lives instead of three. Yet, some gamers thought I
was being unreasonable and felt they should respaun where they died.
Its like, "people, where's your sense of challenge?"
Cheers!
On 11/27/11, Ryan Strunk <[email protected]> wrote:
Post note: I had originally intended to put this post in the main thread,
but it got so far afield I figured I better change the subject line.
Hi Tom,
In the era you and I came from, gamers weren't lazy because they couldn't
be. We had situations where you had to start completely over because the
technology/memory wasn't there to save progress. Even then, though, there
were plenty of ways to start where you left off--passwords, save points,
and
continues come to mind. In Super Mario Brothers there was the "hold A and
press start" trick that let you start at the beginning of the current
world.
Granted you lost all your points, but at least you didn't have to begin
again like poor old Michael Finnegan.
And let's not even get started on the Game Genie/Game Shark.
In today's situation, the bar has lowered significantly. Quick-saving
allows
you to start exactly where you left off. In games like L.A. Noire, you
can
skip a mission automatically if you fail it too many times. In the latest
Mario title, if you're playing 2 player and you die, the other player can
play through the level until they pass the hard part, then pop your
bubble
and respawn you instantly.
So are blind gamers lazy? Maybe, but not any more so, I think, than
mainstream gamers. Most blind gamers never grew up in the "get better or
go
home" era that you and I did, and they never had to face the frustration
of
running out of continues. Gamers and blind gamers don't have that hurdle
anymore, and I think the industry has suffered for it.
Even so, if you never put in "Justin Bailey" to get all the cool weapons
and
see Samus in her bathing suit, I'll eat my keyboard.
Best,
Ryan
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