The Japs do everything better

[Ash]

Fuck Planescape Torment. That isn't a real game.

Play Final Fantasy 6 (1994) from start to finish and then claim that's not art, go ahead. The story could not exist without the game, as it is a tale of adventure, struggle, teamwork, and so forth, these elements amplified by the gameplay in a specific way.

Play Silent Hill (1998) and claim that's not art, go ahead. A psychological horror trip like no other, where its gameplay amplifies the whole thing considerably.

 

[DJOGamer PT]

we're just going in circles now...

let's agree to disagree and move on

 

[Silverfish]

which means everything had to be dragged down the lowest common denominator, meaning consoles.

Which didn't do consoletards any favors either. Our games used to run at 60 fps with extremely rare crashes / glitches until westoids invaded the space.

Animu = game disregarded.

You're chronicling your time playing Nioh in another thread.

Star Trek is Jewish and stupid and ugly.

Star Trek The Motion Picture is excellent, but I can't really argue about the rest.

Unfortunatly, after finally making it's breakout in the 80s but especially in the 90s, western gaming was again kneecapped and brought back to becoming mere toys again by the success of the Playstation and the desire of western companies to tap that commercial venue and emulate console gaming style of development.

Incredibly disingenuous. The success of the OG Playstation had nothing to do with kneecapping pc gaming. The rampant piracy of the pre-Steam era is what drove stateside publishers into the arms of console players.

 

[Ash]

"mere toys"

Hasn't played a single original playstation game, which was peak tier gaming often on par with the peak of PC gaming, thanks largely to the efforts of its Japanese developers.

Insular as fuck!

Around the same time PC was killing it with FPS - all are pretty much "mere toys". RTS? mere toys, outside of some teaching minor aspects of history like AoE. RPGs? Many of the acclaimed RPGs in that era (e.g Fallout, Torment) are storyfag with the gameplay bordering an afterthought and therefore not transcendental art* the likes of which you could find on playstation. But that's the cuckdex's likes. I find games like Deus Ex, System Shock 2, hell even Thief on the other hand to play more to the medium's strengths and made something special.

*What do I mean by transcendental? I mean all the elements working together: gameplay, music, story, art, and using the medium's strengths to create something truly unique. NOT a storyfag game that has good writing but the gameplay is an afterthought.

 

[Beans00]

Ash Didn't have a pc until around 2005(He played doom for the first time in 2007). Lmao.

 

[Ash]

PC gaming since the late 90s. Starting collection was Deer Hunter, Desktop Destroyer, Doom, Duke Nukem 3D, Thief, Global Domination and Age of Empires. Beans00 is a creepy little retard that posts the same shit every thread because he is a pathetic loser that has nothing better to do than attempt to troll me. He does this as he got owned in debate and is an inferior specimen. LMAO.

 

[Lyric Suite]

Star Trek The Motion Picture is excellent, but I can't really argue about the rest.

Star Trek isn't Jewish though. It had Jews that flocked to it and eventually ruined it but conceptionally it's as white as it gets, both the OS and TNG.

 

[Lyric Suite]

The rampant piracy of the pre-Steam era is what drove stateside publishers into the arms of console players.

Yeah no i don't believe that for a second. That's just boomer CEOs being paranoid boomers, then as now. You have retards like the guy who runs Capcon claim mods are basically cheats those empty suites are just that retarded.

Either way, it was consoles that destroyed western gaming. The kind of mindset that defined western gaming couldn't thrive in a console enviorment and the rest is history. The Xbox single handedly destroyed PC gaming.

 

[Lyric Suite]

You're chronicling your time playing Nioh in another thread.

I'm making an effort and Nioh is not THAT animu.

I can tell you that i preferred Sekiro by a mile though.

 

[Ash]

Sekiro is just another entry in a long line of Japanese action games (often with a grounded, gritty tone and no anime). Its roots are in games like Tenchu: Stealth Assassins, Kings Field, Castlevania: SoTN, all original playstation games. Castlevania: SotN is a must-play in particular. Less ignorant talk, more gaming. The games are free, unless you're incapable of figuring out an emulator.

 

[Lyric Suite]

I played Castelvania on GameBoy does that count?

 

[Ash]

Nope! Symphony of the Night has greater artistic value (art direction, soundtrack) and the most overall depth, including of gameplay. It's not the finest example of "games as art" around but it is still certainly notable in that regard. And a must-play game is a must-play game at the end of the day.

You don't get musical masterpieces like this on gameboy, unfortunately:

 

[Lyric Suite]

Well, my argument is that those extra artistic elements that are attached to the game don't make the game itself art.

I think what is happening here is that people are confusing their experience of the game with the actual artistic expressivity of the game's mechanics.

Experience can be a powerful thing for a person but you have to be able to make a distinction between how you feel about something and what that something is objectively. I remember the first time i visited my grandmother's house when i returned from America i had this incredible nostalgic reaction. I used to spend summer there as a little kid and i hadn't seen the place in almost 15 years and every little thing just gave me this great emotional feeling. However, ultimately, objectively speaking, it was just an house like any other.

I think some games can provide the same. Whenever i load up a game i played as a kid i often get this intense feeling. Just hearing the sound effects of such a game can make me feel like i did back then. But, a sound effect is not art, there was no intent to convey any higher meaning or experience through it. It's just a sound effect.

My single favored music track from Torment was this:



This is actually a piece by Vivaldi and was never actually written for the game. Yet, in my head it is now forever associated with the first time i experienced it in the game.

 

[Ash]

Well, my argument is that those extra artistic elements that are attached to the game don't make the game itself art.

Yes, those elements in Castlevania: SotN could stand alone, though they are better being tied to a good game. But my argument is there ARE many games that transcend this notion where the art, story, music etc can be detached from the game. Again, try Silent Hill, for example. That one is simply clear-cut a new form of art. One that lets you LIVE horror media and experience it in ways that horror movie makers and novelists could only dream of, but is far from the only example. You simply can't detach the game from the other elements without the overall impact, meaning etc being sullied.

 

[Silverfish]

Either way, it was consoles that destroyed western gaming. The kind of mindset that defined western gaming couldn't thrive in a console enviorment and the rest is history. The Xbox single handedly destroyed PC gaming.

I'm sure it's not what's intended, but this reads like a terminal case of the "poor me's". Western gaming wasn't destroyed, the pc market is flourishing with Steam, and the western mindset being unable to thrive on consoles is mistaken and, even if it were true, would be a skill issue.

 

[Ash]

Western (and eastern) gaming was destroyed. Everything is braindead and soulless now. But it wasn't consoles lol, that's just more ignorance from someone that never touched consoles in the 90s. Sellout developers, insanely high development budgets, increased demand for graphics & realism is what killed it. AAA games are multi-million dollar investments of insane proportion, of course they play it safe, try to appeal to all, make it braindead so any simpleton can play, pander and follow trends and so forth. That's too much money to allow to fail, at least that is the mentality. A pathetic & weak one, but it does make reasonable sense. Sad as that may be. And prior to that, a lot of high quality cerebral games did indeed fail (e.g Looking Glass' games). Wasn't so much the game being too hardcore as it was lack of marketing though.

 

[Lyric Suite]

Either way, it was consoles that destroyed western gaming. The kind of mindset that defined western gaming couldn't thrive in a console enviorment and the rest is history. The Xbox single handedly destroyed PC gaming.

I'm sure it's not what's intended, but this reads like a terminal case of the "poor me's". Western gaming wasn't destroyed, the pc market is flourishing with Steam, and the western mindset being unable to thrive on consoles is mistaken and, even if it were true, would be a skill issue.

I don't consider sales to be relevant. Western gaming is dead in spirit. Sure games still sell a lot, even on PC, but what difference does it make if they are all made with console in mind and if they are all garbage.

 

[DJOGamer PT]

I think what is happening here is that people are confusing their experience of the game with the actual artistic expressivity of the game's mechanics.

Well I can't talk about the others
But just for the record, I wasn't

You have retards like the guy who runs Capcon claim mods are basically cheats those empty suites are just that retarded.

That retardation is not specific to Crapcom, it's a Japanese thing in general
For them, an author's work belongs to the author even if said work is sale, they don't believe the audience/client has a right to modify that work without permission
You can identify this cultural mindset even in their copyright laws

I'm making an effort and Nioh is not THAT animu.

I can tell you that i preferred Sekiro by a mile though.

 

[Ash]

I don't consider sales to be relevant. Western gaming is dead in spirit. Sure games still sell a lot, even on PC, but difference does it make if they are all made with console in mind and if they are garbage.

Sigh. Console gaming died around the same time. But as usual you only look at it through your narrow lense and continue to talk. Console game != garbage, as a rule. You literally have one in your signature (edit: nope, multiple console games in the sig). GAMING died spiritually, as a whole, unilaterally, in the mid 2000s. Console games today are nothing like those in the 90s, just as PC games today are nothing like those in the 90s. Just stop! It's frustratingly dumb. Especially when the decline and direction of both PC and console gaming was largely driven by PC developers in the 2000s wth the Xbox.

FromSoft games are perhaps the only mainstream Jap console games of today with connection and honor to the past. They're the only ones I consider legit.

 

[Lyric Suite]

Western (and eastern) gaming was destroyed. Everything is braindead and soulless now. But it wasn't consoles lol, that's just more ignorance from someone that never touched consoles in the 90s.

That's not a valid argument, because we have already established that western games and Japanese games are different and operate on a different ideal. Now, it's possible for a Japanese developer to make a great game within the confines of a console enviorment. Even without citing examples from the 90s i missed because i didn't own a console just the existence of Dark Souls is proof of this.

By contrast, i don't think it's possible to make a great PC game under the limitations imposed by consoles. Even if possible, it still would require to narrow the scope of PC gaming considerably. Entire genres that were only possible on PC were wiped out of existance almost overnight. It's also a matter of psychology, because the aspect that inspired PC games and gave PC developers their drive was very much correlated with the PC platform itself. Even the push towards new graphics was neutered. As much as we used to make fun of graphic whores even that element is completely missing now, with people thinking in terms of "generation" because console hardware now sets the limit, and before anybody says "good, means now games are focusing on gameplay". Nope, that hasn't happened at all. The gameplay is still shit (more so in fact), but now the graphics are shit too. Hurray.

 

[Ash]

By contrast, i don't think it's possible to make a great PC game under the limitations imposed by consoles.

There's certainly some limitations, but it has always been vastly overstated. But again, you didn't play console games until recently so don't really know. There's many RTS on console, there's many city builders, many old school awesome FPS, complex first person RPGs like Arx Fatalis and Morrowind...not really much they can't do. Often with a little compromise, but it's extremely minor. The most inaccessible I'd say is RTS, and only really at the competitive level where the cursor is flying all over the place and 500 keyboard shortcuts used per minute.

Most of those game styles can and are still being made by lower budget devs. No AAA is going to bother though. They do not have market appeal that justifies multi-million dollar investment and returns. Why? Graphics whoring made it unviable. See below:

Even the push towards new graphics was neutered. As much as we used to make fun of graphic whores even that element is completely missing now, with people thinking in terms of "generation" because console hardware now sets the limit, and before anybody says "good, means now games are focusing on gameplay". Nope, that hasn't happened at all. The gameplay is still shit (more so in fact), but now the graphics are shit too. Hurray.

Nope, good, because the fucking graphics whoring of short-sighted retards is what killed gaming more than absolutely anything. This is objective truth, ask any old school developer. It drove up budgets from an average of 1 million in the late 90s to an average of 100 million in a mere ten years (spitballing, but it's close), as well as ballooning team size which creates issues of management and vision. If your budget is 100+ mil, as a developer you're pretty much on ball & chain unable to make a high quality game. Your masters wont let you have creative freedom and while that sucks and is cowardly, it does make painful rational sense.

 

[Lyric Suite]

Nope, good, because the fucking graphics whoring of short-sighted retards is what killed gaming more than absolutely anything.

I disagree almost completely. There isn't the slighest bit of evidence this is true. Some of the games that revolutionized computer graphics were also among the most signifant games, like Doom or Unreal. I think the push for graphics was just another aspect of the western ideal of progress and experimentation, and consoles killed that too. Everything bad with western gaming start with the Xbox. The chase for advanced graphics had zero effect on the quality of games, and when consoles put an halt to that or at least slowed it down considerably it never lead to an improvement in terms of gameplay. Nothing was gained we just lost yet another aspect of that made the PC platform different.

 

[Ash]

Well, the true cause is cowardly, greedy execs, publishers, investors whatever who wont budge because they have too much stakes involved. But the catalyst for that is graphics driving up budgets to unsustainable extents.

I think the push for graphics was just another aspect of the western ideal of progress and experimentation, and consoles killed that too

Lol Final Fantasy PS1 had more significant graphics than any 90s PC game. Get a grip! You don't even know. FF7/8/9 budgets = 70 million each or something absurd like that. A significant chunk of that pushing the envelope with graphics. Unreal budget? Probably like 1 million. Doom? $500,000. Not even 1 million. Even Turok 2, an N64 game released the same year as Unreal, has just as numerous and significant if not more impressive technical accomplishments than Unreal, with mocapped animations (now industry standard, not the keyframe vertex manipulation Unreal used), full mesh-based level design (which is now industry standard, not the BSP based geometry Unreal used), and the best particle effects system for weapons & effects in the 90s period (by which Unreal's is laughable in comparison). You live in a PC gaming bubble Sir.

Doom Budget

 

[Cryomancer]

> Berserk
> Genocyber
> Devilman
> For kids
Lol, lmao even.

Yes. Juvenile entertainment is what all those are. Try hard violence is generally a thing for immature people.

Berserk i not only "try hard violence". Berserk explores the peak of mankind against fate itself, since the birth, Guts suffers and fights fate. He Is raped, betrayed, cursed, lost an arm, lost an eye and the last thing that he sees with his eye is the woman that he loves being raped by his "friend" and yet, he continue trying to fight fate.

Devilman is from Go Nagai, famous for it.

And even if this stuff is only "try hard violence", there are animes like Ghost in the shell which explores philosophical questions about human continence and human body much better than any western Cyberpunk game. If you hate violence, there are animes like Monster which is all about a Doctor in Cold war West Germany and questions about human life and ethics.

There are good anime, just search them. Not all of them are violent.

which was peak tier gaming often on par with the peak of PC gaming

LOL. No. The PS1 port of PC games like Diablo 1 proves otherwise.

The rampant piracy of the pre-Steam era is what drove stateside publishers into the arms of console players.

As if there was no rampant piracy with PS1/2...

70 million

70 mi and not even a character creator...

 

[Gastrick]

I don't see how video games fit that notion, not as qua games.

The writing in Torment is art but the writing is not the "game" and could exist just as well outside of it.

Tetris is not art. Pong is not art. Once you reduce games to the essential element that makes them games you have removed any conception of art. You can add art to a game and it can make the experience of playing the game better but doesn't make the game itself art. I loved the music in the arcade version of Tetris:



And in fact the music was one of the main reasons i found the game attractive as a kid. But the game is still not art. Just because you added Bach to your game doesn't mean Tetris was intended to express what the music is expressing:



Certainly not via the gameplay. When i downloaded the mobile version of Tetris it had shitty techno music i instantly despised. But other than that the game was still the same thing.

With Planescape: Torment, by your definition, if it was adapted as a television show or film series, it would not be art then, because the "show" with the same music, backgrounds, character-art, acting and cinematography could exist with different writing. This would mean film also "can't be art" by the same logic, which makes a contradiction, because we know it can be.

If the artistic value of a work comes from the contents of it, then this distinction between "containing art" and "being art" goes away. If having artistic value implies being art.