What on earth does "video-gamey" mean?

[Zogmo]

I have a valid criticsm...It feels like a video game! Nuff said.

I have a valid criticism...It doesn't feel like a vido game!

My "argument" is on equal grounds with yours and therefore they cancel each other out. Now you have no argument.


Ha!

 

[blargney the second]

How so?

Your argument was strong enough to give doubts as to the purported videogameyness of 3e AND 4e! There's no need to compare one edition to the other.

 

[Umbran]

It means some people can't come up with any real, constructive criticism, so they say dumb stuff. It puts me in mind of the sort of thing you might hear on the Fox News Network.

It also apparently means that some of our people get insulting.

I means also that you are to take a vacation from the topic. Don't post in this thread again. Instead, please take the time to consider how you could have posted something constructive that remained civil.

And, by the way, intentional misspelling to avoid the language filters is not cool. We can still tell that you used crass language.

 

[Zogmo]

TwinBahamut, that was interesting. The second half of your last sentence weakens your conclusion though.
-blarg

I think it sums up perfectly what he said. With the slightly more gamist emphasis that 4e has moved into and it's move away from so much number crunching it is less videogamey than 3e if you subscribe to what he wrote. Which I did.

 

[robertliguori]

Videogamey is, to me, mechanics that exist without regard for how the world has been previously described as working, for the obvious purpose of bringing about a (specific) fun game experience.

Two basic examples are Terror-Wall of Stone and NPC invulerability. In the first example, an effect is used on a creature that it should logically bounce off of. The deliberate decision to not adjudicate away these point-specific invulnerabilities (or to generate a system that handles them) smacks very much of a video-game, in which not every combinatoric combination of effects could be personally vetted ahead of time for reasonability. An example of 4E being video-gamey in this way is warforged's lack of immunity to inhaled poisons, despite their lack of requirement to breathe. In a videogame, it could be ignored that a warforged took damage walking through a room full of poison gas; in a tabletop RPG, players are much more likely to ask about simply tying a hood over their character's heads and taking other measures that should stop the poison.

Another example of video-game-osity is where the mechanics fail to provide rules for something because said actions are not the intended results. Many RPGs do not have combat statistics for the nameless NPCs and quest-givers in towns; it is not expected for characters to attempt to murder Barak Breaktooth instead of fetching him his five lion pelts, so Barak is unfightable. In 4E, we have supremely abbreviated statistics for any NPCs not intended to be combat encounters for the PCs, and very little guidelines for figuring out what those statistics are meant to represent in-world.

One extremely non-videogamey aspect of 4E is the ability to dynamically generate skill challenges, to represent a cunning and difficult plan on the part of the PCs to bypass what would otherwise be a difficult or non-surmoutable obstacle. Clever PCs might hear an incidental war cry from the orc scouts, use their Religion skill to realize that the orcs have turned to a debased form of Tiamat-worship, pull out the set of religious relics they previously looted from kobold's caverns, stroll into the camp in full Tiamat-garb, slay the orc's shaman, and use their legendary force of personality to demand that the orcs now worship the PCs. 4E falls down on its lack of videogamey potential, however, when you see the amount of work you need to do to get such a simple concept as "Previous enemies become allies." to mesh with the expected encounter system.

 

[Imp]

Dude, what? I read that four times and I cannot understand what you are saying. A CRPG-reality? What is that? You cannot interpret the dice differently? What? There's a thread in the 4e forum right now about creating character concepts using 4e core. That's interpreting things differently right out of the box.

Slowly try to imagine a world presented in a CRPG, say a recent Final Fantasy, and then compare it to other imaginary worlds you have read about or seen depicted in movies or made up. If you can't make these distinctions, I cannot help you.

 

[jdrakeh]

"video gamey" = "I hate the product that I'm applying this label to!"

 

[TwinBahamut]

Slowly try to imagine a world presented in a CRPG, say a recent Final Fantasy, and then compare it to other imaginary worlds you have read about or seen depicted in movies or made up. If you can't make these distinctions, I cannot help you.

Would you care to be more precise, because apparently you "cannot help me".

I have read about some really strange worlds in literature. I have seen some really strange worlds in movies. I have imagined some really strange worlds in my own head. I have seen some really strange worlds in videogames. At the same time, I have seen countless worlds in all of those mediums I just listed that are perfectly normal.

Honestly, if you are talking about the concepts of verisimilitude and world-building, then there is no such thing as a difference between different mediums. Any particular world or story is just as likely to show up in one medium as any other.

Since you are making a really bold claim that there is such a difference, you are going to need to back it up with some really good and clear examples. Actually, I will phrase that as a challenge. Give me just one videogame that has a world and story (no videogames that are abstract puzzles) that can not possibly be turned into a great movie or tabletop RPG, because I claim that such a thing can't exist.

 

[TwinBahamut]

Videogamey is, to me, mechanics that exist without regard for how the world has been previously described as working, for the obvious purpose of bringing about a (specific) fun game experience.

The problem with this definition is that is not applicable to videogames themselves.

If you define "videogamey" as this, then you exclude a large number of videogames from being "videogamey". For example, please indicate a place in the game I described above, Fire Emblem, where such a "contradictory" mechanic exists. I don't think you can easily find one.

I think you are making the mistake I tried to warn about above: mistaking "gamist" according to Forge theory as meaning the same thing as "like a videogame", or rather masking the false assumption that all videogames are "gamist". Just as much as RPGs, videogames break down into different genres and categories that can possibly be described using terms like "gamist", "simulationist", or "narrativist".

There are videogames out there that would consider what you consider "videogamey" to be a mortal sin. An easy example is the Flight Simulator genre. There are people who have turned the idea of making the flight Simulator experience as authentic as possible into an obsession, going as far as building gigantic mock-ups of airplane cockpits and linking those in to a large network of inter-connected simulated pilots and air-traffic controls. Authenticity and realism are the absolute goals, and anything that gets in the way of that is a flaw. Think of it as a "simulationist" MMO of the purest form, where any difference from reality is merely a byproduct of technical limitations.

Another issue is that apparently your use of the term "videogamey" applies to things that were not influenced by videogames at all. If "videogamey' means a place where events contradict pre-established canon or the laws of reality for the sake of creating an enjoyable experience, then this has been going on since mankind first starting telling stories. How many times have you seen a character do something in a television series (Star Trek is a good example) that blatantly violates some rule of "physics" that was already established in the show?

Two basic examples are Terror-Wall of Stone and NPC invulerability. In the first example, an effect is used on a creature that it should logically bounce off of. The deliberate decision to not adjudicate away these point-specific invulnerabilities (or to generate a system that handles them) smacks very much of a video-game, in which not every combinatoric combination of effects could be personally vetted ahead of time for reasonability. An example of 4E being video-gamey in this way is warforged's lack of immunity to inhaled poisons, despite their lack of requirement to breathe. In a videogame, it could be ignored that a warforged took damage walking through a room full of poison gas; in a tabletop RPG, players are much more likely to ask about simply tying a hood over their character's heads and taking other measures that should stop the poison.

Don't make such quick assumptions about videogames. There are countless videogames where the videogame designers would make the exact opposite choice that the 4E designers have made.

At the very least, I have played plenty of videogames where a mechanical character who did not need to sleep or breathe was completely immune to any condition based on sleeping or breathing, and where a short walk down a corridor filled with poison gas would not hurt that character, but still hurt every other character. At the same time, there are games which would go down the same path as 4E and make "different" characters apply by the same rules. this kind of matter is completely independent of videogames, since videogame designers face the same dilemma as tabletop game designers.

Another example of video-game-osity is where the mechanics fail to provide rules for something because said actions are not the intended results. Many RPGs do not have combat statistics for the nameless NPCs and quest-givers in towns; it is not expected for characters to attempt to murder Barak Breaktooth instead of fetching him his five lion pelts, so Barak is unfightable. In 4E, we have supremely abbreviated statistics for any NPCs not intended to be combat encounters for the PCs, and very little guidelines for figuring out what those statistics are meant to represent in-world.

Even ignoring older games like the Ultima series and many MMOs, there was a relatively recent videogame called Soul Nomad where you can attack, rob, and forcibly recruit any character you can interact with in a town (other than a limited few characters protected by the mysterious Heroman). I also think the Grand Theft Auto series and the way of the Samurai games need to be mentioned. Your statement also completely ignores entire genres that include games like The Sims...

One extremely non-videogamey aspect of 4E is the ability to dynamically generate skill challenges, to represent a cunning and difficult plan on the part of the PCs to bypass what would otherwise be a difficult or non-surmoutable obstacle. Clever PCs might hear an incidental war cry from the orc scouts, use their Religion skill to realize that the orcs have turned to a debased form of Tiamat-worship, pull out the set of religious relics they previously looted from kobold's caverns, stroll into the camp in full Tiamat-garb, slay the orc's shaman, and use their legendary force of personality to demand that the orcs now worship the PCs.

I admit to having a bit of trouble following this one, since you seem to be mixing a couple different ideas together. There are a lot of different factors at work in your example, but nothing there seems to be clear-cut enough for me to comment on.

4E falls down on its lack of videogamey potential, however, when you see the amount of work you need to do to get such a simple concept as "Previous enemies become allies." to mesh with the expected encounter system.

This here is just a rephrasing of "4E's mechanics are bad, so it is videogamey". You would get a lot more respect from me if you dropped the idea that "videogamey means it is bad, and because it is bad it is videogamey".

 

[blargney the second]

I wonder if video games have become synonymous with "modern". VGs are a very modern art form that has evolved massively over the last thirty years. Movies have undergone significant changes as well. Heck, even the fantasy genre of literature is totally different than it was when D&D was born.

If the guys who have created each and every edition of D&D weren't inspired by their contemporary works of art, something would be dreadfully wrong with the world. (For reference, just look at Elmore's art and tell me it's not in touch with the 80s. I dare you.)
-blarg