QuoteYes, it is a provocative statement designed to make me reply to it online. Hence I am doing so now. I have nothing against people saying risky things. But in turn, I am allowed to say when I believe these statements are under-baked and lacking in meaning.
There are real points within this field of discussion. I truly do feel like the perspective is sincere. But sincerity on its own does not mean you can't be walking off into self-destructive and obsessively utilitarian angles that just come across as fash to me. Is that bad faith reading?
Perhaps! But just as the original statement can be provocative in turn, so too can I note when you're drawing suspiciously close to age-old brain traps. And I really think there is a higher standard when branding and sale gets involved. I don't like it.
Quotei know him personally (but we're not close, we just hung out at GDC once and then chatted a handful of times online) and frankly i share a lot of your concerns here and have tried to talk to him about it a bit... but i do also think there's real value in there, too. it's confusing and frustrating.
like.. he'll tell you over and over it doesn't really mean anything, it's just the phrase that has lodged in his brain to encapsulate an inexpressible cluster of feelings developed over a long career, and it's something that has demonstrably gotten him out of a creative rut and Making Stuff again.
but like.. yeah, it lands the wrong way for just about everyone? and i think i agree with you that there's some kind of responsibility that comes with a platform... but there's also good in pushing people to look more deeply at things, to interrogate their angry responses to abstract provocation.
I'm not willing to say "you should never say anything online that might hurt someone". that way lies silence. it's a nebulous, precarious balancing act and you can never know all of the relevant factors so deciding "correctly" is impossible but nevertheless i do think it's good to take risks.
and like. as much as i vehemently do not "agree" with "kill gameplay", it /has/ gotten me to think & talk to people about ideas in a way i like. and it has gotten me the droqevers, which are really great games (with great gameplay in them). haven't played teog yet but i prolly will soon...
but even given all of that i think you're absolutely right that it's kind of too much and there's sort of an abdication of specificity in some of his posts on the subject, so again.. frustrating and confusing!!
Quotelike i'm sorry but it sounds like the point you're hitting on now is "we must return to doing real meaningful work and not waste our time with evil amusements that trap the human soul and pointlessly drag mankind down from its true greatness" like dude get a hold of yourself this is bibleposting
is your point today REALLY a very contrived variation of "art that isn't immediately obvious to understand is just trying to mislead people and real art is all about directly bluntly stating good clean values to people"??? I WONDER IF ANYONE'S EVER SAID THAT ONE BEFORE. kill abstract art btw
Quote"i didnt say that" well you're sure as hell not being particularly clear are you? "make the complex parts of your art fake!" we're out here hand-wringing about whether we have any evidence games are making us better people, why exactly is that seen as the only meaningful goal of this shit
why do we even draw pictures? they may serve some utilitarian purposes at expressing concepts but ultimately they just exist to fill the human mind with nonsense that isn't real. i wouldn't trust any fiction if i were you. stop reading books, they're just making things up to keep you down
and then after spending every other day rambling about the flaws of art and how it's evil and shit you're gonna SELL US ART ABOUT IT??? what am i supposed to take from that?! i don't think it's intentional but it sure comes across really goddamn weird
Quoteand what's really annoying to me in particular is that there are perfectly good kernels of solid points you can find in the depth of some of these ruminations, they occasionally approach real revelations or comments of practical value, but then shrug and veer away to slogan chanting again
Quotelike as someone who routinely traumadumps shit i shouldnt online i think when you get a certain size of following especially in a public-facing space that leans academic you start having this urge to convey all of your fears and thoughts as some sort of preachy take in unhelpful ways
Quoteok gonna stop beating around the bush i dont follow this person and im not trying to start a fight or anything but a lot of their influence bleeds over into my space and i'm tired of it, i subtweeted it before and you know what i'm gonna just post about it now directly
he death 2 gplay stuff is like really particularly frustrating to me and just to be clear it's not even b/c i like games. what i really don't like about it is that it's basically weird puritan hand-wringing that refuses to reduce down to any actionable point and is more about a fancy slogan
Quote from: takunomiI shone a light on every detail in order to understand why such and such is done, and tried removing or changing all of it.yes... this is something i am contending with a lot now actually: something can be intentional even if we can't give a reason for it. sometimes, analysis can be very destructive. i call for more intention. (and more blood.) but i think it's incredibly important to also be explicit that i don't mean things that you can defend verbally, for instance. or even explain to yourself.
Quote from: takunomiI suggest the ma and noise of gameplay . . . The negative space of gameplay. . . . What you do, but aren't supposed to do. . . . The otherplay. . . . it's unintuitive to me to design with otherplay in mind, but that's where the real playfulness exists. . . not delightfully surprising the designer with the toys they gave you, but having fun with the nails they forgot to remove from the carefully constructed playground.oh, takunomi! we're so close! there are a few statements that you make that i want to counter, then i'm going to try and wrap up.
Quote from: takunomiThe game that you DON'T play.i think that the grammar here is sort of muddled and am assuming takunomi means something like, otherplay is what happens when you don't play the game? the game that isn't the game, that you DO play?
Quote from: takunomiit's unintuitive to me to design with otherplay in mindi don't know if you should, or even can. this is the weirdest part. i really think that my ideal is to stop thinking about the player experience completely, and especially stop designing for it. if the goal is otherplay, if the goal is to see your players "having fun with the nails [you] forgot to remove", then the only reasonable thing to do is to not seek to give the players any toys at all, don't construct a playground.