Videogame culture needs to stop fetishizing skill!

[Acelius]

Fetishizing ? Sexual arousal triggered by impressive displays of mechanical skill or strategy? Does it really happen to anyone? lol

But really, this just seems like a hit piece on the 'game journalists must be decently skilled at gaming' debacle.

I feel a little sexy after clutching a round in CS:GO or Rainbow Six: Siege.

[Deleted]

I see nothing wrong with a reviewer who's bad at certain games reviewing a game he's bad at.

If he manages to remain objective about the game there is nothing wrong, but it is quite a task, he is probably bad because he does not like that game genre at all.
If he starts by explaining that he does not like that genre, or that he is very bad at playing games, well that is ok for me, i will take that into consideration when reading his review.

[Aeula]

You don't seem to understand what's going on. The article is defending a guy that wasn't able to beat the first level of a game and struggled to get past the tutorial. Both of which are actually extremely easy things to overcome. It wasn't a "hair-tearingly frustrating 'challenge'"... It was basic.

Also, "hair-tearingly frustrating" for you may be exciting and fun for someone else. Fun is HIGHLY subjective.

I meant in general. I didn't read the article.

[Lodreh]

https://www.pastemagazine.com/articl...ing-skill.html...

What dreck. You can't take a reviewer/ critic seriously when they end the article with... "After all, they’re just games." This demeans the value others place on games and those that make a living play, criticizing, or writing about them. Yes. You can absolutely demand that a critic pass a freaking tutorial in order to speak knowledgeably about the gaming experience. It's like reviewing a movie by watching only a piece of the trailer. If games are not your thing don't review them... but above all... don't downplay the developer's choice in difficulty by saying they're just games.

[Acidbaron]

Instead of raging and blaming the "culture" or "community", one can ask help and advice from that same group and often will get it if you aren't a obnoxious person.

I now feel dirty having clicked the link, what he will without doubt by looking at the number of views that he is right. Or something else equally illogical.

[Deleted]

Not really. LoL does require a lot of meta-knowledge I guess because they shit up the game with dozens of heroes for the $$$, but the basic gameplay is massive amounts of anal click spam with archaic controls.

Overwatch, I jumped in on the free weekend and in my third game ever already went 17-4. Then next match I go 3-5 because if you don't have a decent matched team you literally can't do anything in that game because every hero is half a functional character and the Blob is King. Besides that quick match is a ghost town because the core gameplay is shit. People basically only play in arcade and fuck around in Lucio ball and DM etc.

You are literally the most clueless person ive ever seen on these forums. You Can hate the games. You Can hate the community. But denying it tales skill is either butthurt or plain stupid

[Duravian]

I still haven't beat Dark Souls 1.
Got past Ornstein and Smough and just stopped.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯

But to really respond. I do think that reviewers should have some amount of skill. It's not fair if you stick someone who sucks at platformers on reviewing Super Meat Boy, because they're going to have a bad time, and that's going to reflect in their review if they just can't enjoy the game.

One would argue that's the best way to review a game. If the goal is to make a game that's fun for all audiences, get someone who isn't used to that kind of gameplay to try it out. If even they can like it, it might just be a really fun game.

[Rustedsaint]

And that's one whole another can of worms: should developers cater for everyone?

No they should not cater to everyone, they shouldfind their core target and then maybe add afew different lv difficulties to pull in more players, but they shouldn't try to appease everyone.
Take the souls series, the ad for that game series was be prepared to die.
Read the article on the site just to the point he tried to defend them. If I could comment on it, it would be to get good scrub.
I don't want to read crap reviews by someone who fails at a game

[Deleted]

https://twitter.com/deantak/status/906768747720974336

Videogame jornalists need to stop fetishizing inaptitude!

[Kazgrel]

People need to stop misusing the word "fetish".

Maybe slinging around words with sexual zing is their fetish.

I do agree with your sentiment here.

[Ooid]

Here's the thing: there is an assumption that the better you are at a game, the more knowledgeable you are at said game. I would trust a chess grandmaster's opinion more than I would a novice's. The grandmaster had a deeper understanding of the game mechanics and thus a more informed opinion on the quality of the game.

[Al Gorefiend]

My two cents?

The idea of video games having a culture is just dumb honestly. "Video game culture?" People who label and describe themselves as video game players? That's pretty gross. Video games are fun entertainment but the many who devote their lives to it sounds sad to me. Do people who watch movies describe themselves as a collective of "movie-goer" culture?

Video games should stay hobbies, not lifestyles, and people need to stop already with taking pride in how much they play.

[Deleted]

My two cents?

The idea of video games having a culture is just dumb honestly. "Video game culture?" People who label and describe themselves as video game players? That's pretty gross. Video games are fun entertainment but the many who devote their lives to it sounds sad to me. Do people who watch movies describe themselves as a collective of "movie-goer" culture?

Video games should stay hobbies, not lifestyles, and people need to stop already with taking pride in how much they play.

It's not the same as a movie culture. It's closer to people devoting their life to a sport. It's competitive and if you are good enough you can make money off of it. Th existence of gamers is nothing new, it's just more mainstream now. You might think seing yourself as a gamer is sad but I think that very notion is sad. Why do you feel like you can be a judge on what other people should do with their life. How can you tell someone else if his life is worth living? Are you omnipotent?

[Super Kami Dende]

It's what happens when "journalists" who were often the Teenagers that gave shit to Gamers, go into an industry like Gaming because it suddenly became mainstream and easy to make money in.

So basically useless cunts.

- - - Updated - - -

My two cents?

The idea of video games having a culture is just dumb honestly. "Video game culture?" People who label and describe themselves as video game players? That's pretty gross. Video games are fun entertainment but the many who devote their lives to it sounds sad to me. Do people who watch movies describe themselves as a collective of "movie-goer" culture?

Video games should stay hobbies, not lifestyles, and people need to stop already with taking pride in how much they play.

It's moreso pride in how well they play. So no different to 99% of other competitive hobbies.

[Deleted]

This is why game demo's are great, can actually play a part of the game yourself and make up your own mind if you think you will like it or not.

[Charge me Doctor]

I like how "article" became "blogpost". Seriously, complaining about difficulty of not difficult games on a gaming magazine is just astounding

[stellvia]

My two cents?

The idea of video games having a culture is just dumb honestly. "Video game culture?" People who label and describe themselves as video game players? That's pretty gross. Video games are fun entertainment but the many who devote their lives to it sounds sad to me. Do people who watch movies describe themselves as a collective of "movie-goer" culture?
Video games should stay hobbies, not lifestyles, and people need to stop already with taking pride in how much they play.

I dunno about culture, but I enjoy analyzing the gameplay loops and ways they chose to design certain things, how things are breadcrumbed to improve flow, etc. Then again, I'm interested in designing my own game when I have time, so that is probably outside the norm for most that play games. It does make it easier for me to articulate why a game is good/bad or at least qualify why I feel the way I do about it.

[Harthmut]

Fun is all that should matter.
I have fun winning.

[callipygoustp]

Not seeing a convincing argument for stopping.

[Hiricine]

The entire point of being a noob is to learn to get good.

Its really the fault of games that match players randomly and then expect the noobs will claw their way up from terribleness. Its pretty fun teaching someone to play a new game, playing Dark souls as a veteran and teaching new players is way more enjoyable than you would think.