Hard Light Productions Forums
Off-Topic Discussion => Gaming Discussion => Topic started by: Mika on November 25, 2010, 03:03:11 pm
-
This has been circling around my mind for some time already, but are you other old schoolers getting tired of the new generation games? I can't put my finger there what is exactly wrong in them, but it just doesn't feel the same any more. The irony is that now when I have the resources and
will to buy a perfect gaming rig (can be used to computing too) most of the stuff I find from the gameshop shelves doesn't interest me single bit (pun intended). The only thing I'm waiting for is Duke Nukem Forever - and even that is debatable if it will be anything like the 3D, and after that I guess there just won't be anything any more. It is a weird feeling, but it is as if you had seen that all before. Fallout New Vegas might have something, but I can't help but think that the original Fallouts are still more interesting and better gameplay and gamedesign wise. At least New Vegas is a vast improvement from Fallout 3.
The point is I feel the new games are uninspired and resemble movies, delivering some cheap thrills but lack the game and any sort of replay value in there. Modern FPSs are almost unplayable to me (and I don't play multi, with the exception of Falcon 4.0 AF), mainly a linear corridor with prescripted events and cutscenes where generic hero #32 strikes imposing pose #25 and says cliche #6. It is not hard to understand why Duke Nukem would work so well here for us old schoolers. Why is it that I still find myself playing likes of C&C 1, Fallout 2, or Falcon 4.0, and long for the original Doom with 2010 graphics? Or Jagged Alliance 2 for that matter? Although World of Goo is indeed a nice modern game that actually has replayability. I could check if anyone has remade Supaplex and recreated all those devious puzzles too.
Tomb Raider Underworld was a slight disappointment. Yes it does look fantastic with all graphic settings at MAX and sound world is incredible, but the game itself is rather glitchy, and the controls don't work that well as they did in Legend. So gameplaywise it was actually a step down, missing some of the adventuring part in some levels. It had fantastic graphics and models, but with a rather odd plot that was presented in a stupid way and cut that badly that even I spotted the gaps immediately. On top of it all, they put the missing parts out as DLC, but they are XBOX exclusive! :eek2: :mad: There really should be a law against this sort of thing! I'll try Tomb Raider 2 next, seems that the modders have improved the graphics by some amount to make playing it bearable with a wide screen monitor.
So what is it with cutting nowadays? Is it that the arts have become so expensive to model and develop that anything else has to suffer? Angel of Darkness could have been a fantastic game, ditto with KOTOR2 (which still doesn't exactly feel complete even after the Restoration Content Mod), not that I would be ungrateful for the modders for repairing most of the broken stuff. The original plots would have been awesome in both of those games - yes even Angel of Darkness, as at one step it would have started with Lara being depressed (almost to point of becoming alcoholic) that burns down her mansion (copied in Underworld where Doppelganger does this)... One plot possibility of KOTOR2 would have had Atris as the Darth Traya making you to do her bidding and being your love interest (if male) at the same time. The thing was that the Darth Traya could have been Kreia or Atris and you never knew until the end. Perhaps these plots would have made programming complicated or broken the franchise by somewhat, but it would also have made them much more memorable - and imaginative.
Perhaps I should opt to see the performances in local theatres (not movie theatres) instead of gaming? Or simply start to enjoy another art form in my free time? It just feels like gaming just isn't anymore what it was back then. So please, post your thoughts!
EDIT: Typos
-
I feel yeah, most modern games are getting a little 'boring' and sort of lack the depth and creativity of yesteryear.
You should give STALKER call of pripyat and shadow of chernybol a whirl, (pretty cheap on steam) they're not like modern FPS's and feel quite different and awesome. relatively open world, stuff to do/explore, great depth, mechanics and atmosphere.
and then the mods open it up even more.
That's what I've done, and its so worth it
-
I'm going to (sort of) drag in the PC vs console thing here. In general, PC-only games seem to have more depth, because you can stick more content in them and you have more inputs. Since game devs are sort of shunning PC games in general, and will only port stuff over from consoles, we see stuff suffer. It doesn't mean that it's impossible to make a deep game for console, but the trends seem to indicate that this is the case. Might be illusory correlation though.
Also, games with ****ty replayability means that you need to constantly buy new titles if you don't want to get bored. Profit.
-
I have no intention of giving up gaming until the very day I die.
Though I don't buy as much new stuff these days, it's true. But it's not all bad at all. Mirror's Edge was pure excellence. Ditto Portal, and Portal 2 (which I've already pre-ordered) looks incredible, and the next installment of Half-Life will be amazing if Valve ever remembers that franchise exists. And then there was Sin and Punishment 2 on the Wii just recently. Absolutely incredible game (though the dialogue really needed some work).
Then, of course, there's a new Touhou release at least once a year... but that's kind of a niche here in America. Meh, whatever. They're fun games with clever dialogue and awesome music.
My advice would be to get out of the mainstream a bit. It tends to get clogged with cliche trash until someone comes up with a bright idea, stirs everything up, and gives everyone else something new to copy. Not-mainstream titles tend to be quirky, and they tend to try new things more often, because no one's gonna pay attention to them otherwise. Obviously, sometimes this doesn't work, but sometimes it does, and it's more fun for it.
-
For this (http://www.moddb.com/mods/one-must-fall-destiny) I will shed a single tear of joy. Especially the remixed title song. OMF 2097 was great. Hopefully they get it out some day.
The high resolution mod of Deus Ex would be nice too.
Back to topic though. I see what you guys mean, my solution has been playing tabletop games with friends. Arkham Horror is one of the best recent ones we have found.
The other thing about the computer games nowadays is the difficulty. I just find most of them far too easy, even on the hardest possible levels. Though this doesn't matter that much if the game play works. One of the most balanced all-around game that I have played is Prince of Persia Sands Of Time. Tomb Raider Legend and Anniversary were good too, though the combat doesn't work that well in them. But at least Anniversary required some thought in the puzzles. The single complaint in all of them together is that they were linear games and if I happened to look around too much on the first play through, there were not so many treasures to go back to hunt in there anymore.
But yeah, I guess I could take a look at the mods and non-mainstream stuff. There was this one Japanese game with a Final Fantasy type combat that actually managed to put up a challenge, I've still not seen all the possible endings there after three months of playing. It was rather refreshing to die in a couple of game rounds from the start at the first go. No mercy for the beginners that make stupid mistakes and surprisingly I found it much more Fun! And I returned back prepared and better on the second try! Though there were a couple of things they could have made a tutorial of :lol:, without reducing the difficulty at all. I wonder how many gems have slipped under the radar. Psychonauts could be something that I could try.
By the way, I didn't like Half-life 2 that much as a game. It told a decent story, was scenic and had interesting locations, but as a game I only played through it once (hardest possible) and haven't done much with it after that. I liked Painkiller more as a shooter. Think what Half-life 2 would have been like had the early build not been leaked to internets before the release.
-
Haven't actually played a game for fun in over a year. All my playing has been debugging or testing. Heck can't remember the last time I didn't run a debug build.
So while gaming has gotten old there is more to do then just play.
-
There are decades of stuff out there you could still play, and Steam is happy to help you along. If not X-Com, something else. Aquanox would probably appeal to an FS player. If you run back to DosBox, Archimedean Dynasty if you can find a copy. The freeware rebuild of Wing Commander: Privateer.
The industry has been in business a long time. If what they're producing now doesn't appeal to you, spend some time in the past. It'll still be here when you resurface.
-
By the way, I didn't like Half-life 2 that much as a game. It told a decent story, was scenic and had interesting locations, but as a game I only played through it once (hardest possible) and haven't done much with it after that. I liked Painkiller more as a shooter. Think what Half-life 2 would have been like had the early build not been leaked to internets before the release.
Understandable. Not a huge FPS fan myself, but I love Half-Life's atmosphere and sense of immersion. That's really what I admire most about gaming as a medium: to me, it seems to be able to pull you into a story so much more completely than books or film (though I like both of those too). Naturally, that's if it's done properly; there are plenty of games that do not accomplish that. It makes me sad, because I feel there's so much untapped potential for incredible storytelling in games, and developers mostly aren't seeing it.
But of course, a lot of people aren't looking for that, and that's fine too.
-
I can see where you're coming from. I think we still get some excellent games today but they essentially follow well-established formulas that the publishers know are guaranteed to sell well, and it's rare to see a game that actually tries something new. The most original games I'm seeing these days are mods and freeware and indie titles. If you look back 10 years ago, you can see a big difference in the variety of games back then compared to what we have now.
As far as FPSs go, I agree that modern singleplayer ones focus too much on creating a "cinematic experience" and essentially try to be movies instead of having any sort of gameplay depth. I like these types of games but I don't want everything to be like this. This trend in FPSs is similar to that interactive movie phase that games went through in the mid 90s, and it may eventually end given that the technology (i.e. graphics) has topped out for a while now. Most of the multiplayer game types I like (arena-style and 6DOF FPSs, non-MMO space sims) have fallen out of fasion these days too, with the exception of classic-style RTSs.
I can't see myself giving up gaming though. As ngtm1r said, there are enough existing old titles and mods out there to last a lifetime. I probably spend more time playing these games than newer ones, although there are still modern ones that catch my interest. In the last few months, I played Psychonauts, MOO2 and Clockwerx (in a Mac emulator), all for the first time. I'm currently playing Homeworld and some Descent 2 fanmade level sets.
I could check if anyone has remade Supaplex and recreated all those devious puzzles too.
Megaplex is a modern Windows port of it, although it still uses the same graphics. The Mac port of this game, Infotron, totally owned my life as a kid. :D
Psychonauts could be something that I could try.
This game is exceptional and probably the most original title I have seen in many years, but it's a pretty easy game.
By the way, I didn't like Half-life 2 that much as a game.
I think this is a strictly average game and doesn't match up at all to the best FPSs. I never understood why it is so popular.
-
i think it may just be were all getting old. i dont play gmes as much as i used to. but mods and indie games are always a good way to go. i had been playing mechwarrior living legends strait for like a month or so, with on and off starcraft 2 binges. very few new games interest me at all.
-
We're in the middle of an indie game renaissance... plenty of good, innovative stuff out there for you to enjoy, at a fraction of the cost of AAA titles. Enjoy!
-
Megaplex
That I gotta try. Some of those puzzles were downright devilish.
Most of the multiplayer game types I like (arena-style and 6DOF FPSs, non-MMO space sims) have fallen out of fashion these days too
Yup. A new 6DOF FPS would be great to see too. I recommend Flying Saucer if you can find it. It was never released, but it was (legally?) downloadable in Home of the Underdogs. It was rather fun game with a completely different flying "model".
Wing Commander: Privateer
The problem is that I have already played through Privateer (wasn't that interesting, most of the stuff I did between story missions did not affect anything). But getting the 2002 level computer with XP to run it was another thing... Required devious usage of DOS 6.22 boot disk, CD-ROM drivers and RAMDRIVE.SYS... :lol: Wing Commander I was more interesting, but I think Wing Commander II was even better when it was launched back then. I played the **** out of that game and its expansion disks, but currently I don't have any wish to go back there any more. I have never been able to acquire Wing Commander III that could be played in Windows XP, but there is also something generally odd about the games of its age: they look horribly dated to me. While 320x240 MCGA era games like Falcon 3.0 are still OK graphically to me (it's weird), there is something what I don't like nowadays in the earliest 3D engines. They would need graphical updates to become interesting again. OMF 2097 or Fallout I still looks good to me, but early Tomb Raiders and Deus Ex really need graphical updates - which communities seem to provide, luckily. Anything coming after 2002 looks good enough for me already.
I think this is a strictly average game and doesn't match up at all to the best FPSs. I never understood why it is so popular.
Agreed. It had its moments, but the weird thing was that those weren't related to the shooting parts. I don't even remember the shooting that much, with the exception of guiding those rockets on those helicopters, but that's about it.
Nobody else thinks that the gaming industry is doing seriously wrong if people still want to play the old games, rather than the new ones? But I guess it's the same with old movies or older books. They just don't make them any more like that. I just find it sad that I nowadays just pass the gaming shelves just like I started to pass movies shelves years earlier. But now even the book shops can't be trusted(!). One of the most thought provoking books for a long time I came across recently was written in 1948. No recent author has been able to put such depth in there.
-
It's mostly an illusion. Especially in science fiction the quality of material being produced right now massively outstrips what we had in the past.
-
If the illusion has an effect, is the illusion real, though?
Personally, I was never big into the gaming scene as a kid as I grew up with a Mac. However, even then, I did have quite a few rather great games like X-Wing, the Hornet flight simulators, etc. All of those had a replayability, scope, and length like few games today can match. Also, they were not at all easy in the later parts. Some of the older games are much, much harder in terms of difficulty than newer ones, despite their relative simplicity.
And perhaps it's a bit ignorant, but I have seldom been enthralled with major game studios for some time. My favorite games for a while have been from independent developers, and are thus a bit out of the spotlight. Good games are still out there, but might be a bit tough to find.
-
Nobody else thinks that the gaming industry is doing seriously wrong if people still want to play the old games, rather than the new ones?
Except they aren't, and people don't.
The new games are still selling massively well. People love the new games. The one who is different is you. Your perceptions and opinions have changed.
Not that there's anything wrong with that, it happens to all of us. Just try not to let it blind you to new quality. Maybe they don't make fun things like they used to, but that doesn't mean they can't come up with new fun things of a different kind. Just be willing to look for them.
-
It's mostly an illusion. Especially in science fiction the quality of material being produced right now massively outstrips what we had in the past.
I don't read science fiction that much. One of the best sci-fi books I can recall was by Stanislaw Lem (there is some amount of hilarious Red propaganda in the book), which was about an expedition launched to Venus, that found out the planet was indeed inhabited before and the whole planet was destroyed in a nuclear war, and nothing survived the devastation. The other was called Solaris, which is about the aliens being so different that it is impossible to understand or communicate with them. The creature in the book happens to be a water like substance that covers an entire planet... But I liked more about the expedition to Venus - it still remains the best sci-fi book I have read. The Dig had parts which reminded me of Stanislaw Lem's books. Some people recommended Hyperion series, I found them to be rather uninteresting and struggled to go through them. I don't remember anything but the paper back book picture of some creature. But Dune by Frank Herbert was a good read.
Except they aren't, and people don't.
The new games are still selling massively well. People love the new games. The one who is different is you. Your perceptions and opinions have changed.
I know I'm different. But it appears I'm not the only one. It just seems that what used to be the last bastions of imagination are... well, are not that any more. But I can hardly call it a quality game if I spent less than 20 hours in it. I have probably thousands of playing hours in Falcon 3.0, hundreds in Falcon 4.0, ditto with Civilization II and many others. I just don't know what I should be thinking about the bestseller game that lasts less than ten hours. Or recent bestseller books that I can't remember anything about, I just know I read them.
Let's see what I have now on the shelf that I should play through:
Baldur's gates
Early Tomb Raiders
Jagged Alliance 2 and Unfinished Business
Sam & Max Season 2 (Sam & Max Season 1 was fun, but short and these games have no replay value!)
Runaway Dream of the Turtle (bought because I liked Runaway I)
Myst V
Siberia II
Mass Effect 2
Civ IV
Supreme Commander (I'm not touching SPCOM II)
When I finish those, I guess my gaming days will pretty much be over. For some reason I'm already spending more time here in the forum rather than playing games.
-
Oh I just found out that the 1948 book I was talking about has been translated in English.
The author is Mika Waltari (And I know my screen name is Mika, it is also my real first name. Mika is a common Finnish name, shortened from Mikael by the way. But this is not marketing, the author died 30 years ago and I'm not him.)
The book is called "The Adventurer" and its continuation "The Wanderer" are among the best books I have ever read. I also heartily recommend "The Egyptian" by the same author. All of those books have depth I didn't know could exist until I read them.
The Adventurer is an interesting story of traveling through Europe during the time Luther was nailing his notes. It is told from a Finnish perspective and suffice to say, there happens a lot in this book, at the end they are storming Rome and ousting the Pope... First 100 pages I laughed continuously since the dialogue is downright hilarious, especially anything related to religion.
The story continues in The Wanderer, where main character accepts the Islamic faith unknowingly (I don't want to spoil that if you happen to get the book) and becomes a slave. His status then slowly raises and he finds out that the Ottoman Empire at that time is much more rich and much more developed than anything else in Europe, mainly thanks to the grand vizier that actually isn't a bad guy at all in this book! The Wanderer also has probably one of the most surprising and depressing endings I have ever read. Don't get me wrong, it certainly is a good ending, it is just downright depressing.
"The Egyptian" is from the time of Pharaohs, and discusses the nature of two different religions. Oh, and it is an adventure story at the same time, the main character ends up in the labyrinth of Minos at some point...
-
Yup. A new 6DOF FPS would be great to see too. I recommend Flying Saucer if you can find it. It was never released, but it was (legally?) downloadable in Home of the Underdogs. It was rather fun game with a completely different flying "model".
I'll need to check that one out. Apart from the Descent series, there were a couple of other 6DOF games back in the late 90s too. Forsaken was one (although more multiplayer focused) and both Incoming games have some 6DOF parts.
Personally, I was never big into the gaming scene as a kid as I grew up with a Mac. However, even then, I did have quite a few rather great games like X-Wing, the Hornet flight simulators, etc.
You may have gotten into it just a few years too late. I grew up with the Mac too and it was arguably the premier gaming platform in the late 80s and early 90s, but it had fallen away by the mid 90s.
Also, this thread reminded me of the following image: :p
(http://i.imgur.com/BITmX.jpg)
-
That is one thing I've noticed about FPS's, players today want more action and less exploration.
I can't say one style is definitively better than the other, as I've enjoyed both, but it would be cool for a new not-Metroidvania game to feature some massive, sprawling levels to explore. Growing up playing Descent kinda instills a need for exploring, you know?
I just had a deeply philosophical thought about all this, but... yeah, it's not really worth sharing. It bears more thinking about.
/me ponders.
-
I can't say one style is definitively better than the other, as I've enjoyed both, but it would be cool for a new not-Metroidvania game to feature some massive, sprawling levels to explore. Growing up playing Descent kinda instills a need for exploring, you know?
The GTA knockoffs have that which you seek. Just Cause 2, Saints Row 2, Red Faction: Guerrilla, a bunch of others that aren't coming to mind...
-
I can't say one style is definitively better than the other, as I've enjoyed both, but it would be cool for a new not-Metroidvania game to feature some massive, sprawling levels to explore. Growing up playing Descent kinda instills a need for exploring, you know?
The GTA knockoffs have that which you seek. Just Cause 2, Saints Row 2, Red Faction: Guerrilla, a bunch of others that aren't coming to mind...
What's funny is that SR2 is better than GTA. :<
-
Red Dead Redemption.
-
Metroid Prime, the first one. the others are good but not the same.
-
I've been hit by this too but I'm already at the third stage...
1 - Get tired of gaming
2 - Try to find out why I'm tired of gaming, is it a mix of industry shift or me being different or both or this or that and or what etc...
3 - Give up trying to find out why, end up lazy, forget reasoning, ignore 99.99% of new releases in the market, move on, nothing gets done or changes, etc...
So I have no idea why I'm tired of gaming. The same goes for anime (for me anyway), but my actions aren't exactly following my words...
And I can't seem to find the X-Superbox anywhere... /off-topic rant
-
Metroid Prime, the first one. the others are good but not the same.
I know Metroid Prime, and love the series. (Take a wild guess at the origin of my screename.)
Even Prime 3 was sufficiently awesome to keep my interest, despite the laughably easy "Normal" difficulty (Hypermode difficulty was much better).
As for the others, thanks for the recommendations. I'll look into 'em.
-
As a fan of City Builders, I've noticed a similar trend in those games as well, if you compare, for example, Sim City 4 with Sim City Societies, the graphics may have improved in the latter, but most of the gameplay elements that actually made the game a 'City Builder' has gone to seemingly make room for glowy particle effects etc.
It seems that part of the problem is the attempt to appeal to the widest possible audience, so the stuff that is considered 'too cerebral' tends to be sacrificed for the sake of accessability. The game was obviously aimed at a younger audience, and whilst the 'City' existed, there seemed to be a distinct lack of 'Sim'.
-
I tend to favor games that don't seemingly get old (at least to me). Such games usually thus have endless replay value for various reasons - incredible length/scale, mission editors (make games within games!), open parameters (AKA Civilization, Master of Orion), or are generally moddable. There might have been something I missed, but I think that covers most of the main bases.
One of my favorite companies is Spiderweb Software, actually. For old-school RPGs with huge missions, enormous areas, and gazillions of things to send said RPG parties out on, this has got to be one of the best developers out there. Well, at least I think so. Regardless, I'd recommend the Avernum series to anyone.
-
It's mostly an illusion. Especially in science fiction the quality of material being produced right now massively outstrips what we had in the past.
I don't read science fiction that much.
The good old 'This seems like it's not very good lately, oh, you say it is, well I don't pay much attention to it' argument!
I've been gaming since I was very young; I started with classics like Mechwarrior 2 and I've put hundreds of hours into games like Civ, Deus Ex, Falcon 4 and Baldur's Gate. Today's games - Red Dead Redemption, Mass Effect 2, Arkham Asylum - match or exceed these games in just about every respect.
-
Oh jeez, I dunno if anything's caught up to or beaten Falcon 4.0: AF yet except for well...flying an actual F-16. :D LOMAC comes close but you haven't mentioned it.
-
The 90's were prime-time for the popularization of flight simulators. When we were getting the Macworld magazine back then, it seems that whenever you'd make a significant purchase, you'd get a copy of one of the Hornet flight simulators from Graphic Simulations as a complimentary item. Today... Well...
Not so much.
Sure there's a lot of great simulators out there today which usually outstrip the old ones in most every respect, but they're definately a niche product today. Despite being a complex simulator, Falcon seems like it was easy enough for the typical flight sim pilot to get the knack of. It was also specialized enough that it had a rythim of its own that made the program truly unique. Unfortunately, its complexity, tied with the greater technology of the late 90's/early 2000's coincided with the downfall of the popular flight simulator.
I think one problem (or boon, which is hopefully more often the case) today is that programs tend to be streamlined for ease of use. That's not a bad thing as far as user-friendliness is concerned, but is seemingly has the side effect in many regards of "dumbing-down" the program and making it less comprehensive. A great deal of the widespread or popular games often seem to meet this stereotype. This is due to the fact that developers seem to be concerned more so with the user getting a greater deal of enjoyment rather than frustration out of a product - and a "watered-down" effect is the apparent outcome. Heck, I can't remember ever beating a final mission properly in Hornet and surviving!
:blah:
-
Yeah, ah, I remember those days. I got a helluva lot of fun out of games like Hind 95 and Apache. Jeez, whatever happened to Flight Unlimited?
This 'dumbing down' of games is all well and good for the most part, but damn, it's a pity we've gone from something a hair's breadth short of a mainstream genre to a niche avenue. :(
-
One of my favorite companies is Spiderweb Software, actually. For old-school RPGs with huge missions, enormous areas, and gazillions of things to send said RPG parties out on, this has got to be one of the best developers out there. Well, at least I think so. Regardless, I'd recommend the Avernum series to anyone.
Thanks for the clue. Now I only need to figure out how to pay those. I'll have to take a look at that after Christmas.
The good old 'This seems like it's not very good lately, oh, you say it is, well I don't pay much attention to it' argument!
I've been gaming since I was very young; I started with classics like Mechwarrior 2 and I've put hundreds of hours into games like Civ, Deus Ex, Falcon 4 and Baldur's Gate. Today's games - Red Dead Redemption, Mass Effect 2, Arkham Asylum - match or exceed these games in just about every respect.
But it's true too. I haven't read that much science fiction, and it is not a large factor in the whole broad range of literature. I even put the sci-fi books I have read for you to see and compare. If there is a book that is better than those I listed, I'd like to read it too. But as with gaming, I think there is something odd about the current authors if I find books written hundred years ago considerably better than the new releases. Computers should ease up writing of truly epic novels, but what we actually get is more pop-corn kind of books. I can't escape the feeling that the former books were written because the writer wanted to tell something - it might have been a general philosophical argument of something in life, or just human nature itself. Current books are more about writing for writing's sake, i.e. to keep the author alive. I don't mean that I would despise their work of researching the backgrounds or minute details, but it seems that the books aren't in any ways touching any more. That is to say, the heart is missing.
The interesting thing is that I found MW2 when it came out actually rather limited as a game. I had played earlier flight sims, and after Falcon 3.0 and F-15 SE3 it was mainly like a arcade sim missing the third dimension. I played through it two times (Falcons and Wolves), but got bored. A lot of people said there are interesting tactics in there, I just didn't find them, neither did the engine actually support creative thinking that much. Red Dead Redemption Red Faction: Guerrilla was stupendously boring. As I said earlier, a Generic Hero #19 doing fetch quests. Red Dead Redemption = Borderlands = Saboteur in my eyes, and none of them impressed me. I can't say much about ME2 since I haven't yet played it - ME1 seems interesting at the moment, but I don't expect that it will hold my interest to play it several times in a way KOTORs did. I admit Arkham Asylum looks nice in Prince of Persia kind of way, but I haven't played Batman yet. But a current flight sim exceeding Falcon 4.0, I haven't seen that yet, they may upgrade the graphics but nothing has came close to the campaign itself - or will come in the foreseeable future.
And as for dumbing down, I agree with that. The games are seen more as entertainment in a way movies are, and the mass markets will follow the average. The average consumer doesn't want complexity or demanding stuff, he just wants to relax (as do I occasionally). But given that gaming was once viewed as an escape route from the all too familiar sitcom on telly, it has nowadays become the sitcom.
EDIT: Sorry, mixed up Red Faction: Guerrilla and Red Dead Redemption by the title names. My bad.
-
By the way, introduce FS2 to your friend who has been playing consoles the last couple of years. Let him play through the training missions and see how many times he fails (my friend failed twice, once for touching the controls when told not to do so and the second time in missile evasion). Then let him play the first mission at the Normal difficulty. My friend died three times on the first head on fight on the first mission and gave up! :lol:
Boy I was surprised to see that! I would think avoiding the shots would be self-evident, but for some reason that thought didn't cross his mind.
-
But it's true too. I haven't read that much science fiction, and it is not a large factor in the whole broad range of literature. I even put the sci-fi books I have read for you to see and compare. If there is a book that is better than those I listed, I'd like to read it too.
There are many, many books out there. The ones you read, while certainly not bad, are also 40 or more years old; SF storytelling did go through a lot of changes in that time period.
But as with gaming, I think there is something odd about the current authors if I find books written hundred years ago considerably better than the new releases. Computers should ease up writing of truly epic novels, but what we actually get is more pop-corn kind of books.
Sturgeon's Law is still in effect. Also, never underestimate the sales potential of a movie tie-in. Authors will write what they can sell (and you rarely get to read unsold novels).
I can't escape the feeling that the former books were written because the writer wanted to tell something - it might have been a general philosophical argument of something in life, or just human nature itself. Current books are more about writing for writing's sake, i.e. to keep the author alive. I don't mean that I would despise their work of researching the backgrounds or minute details, but it seems that the books aren't in any ways touching any more. That is to say, the heart is missing.
Then I would suggest you're reading the wrong books. I would recommend to check out Richard Morgan, Charles Stross or Iain M Banks for some truly cool reading experiences. John Scalzi's Old Man's War series is also quite good. Oh, and Neal Stephenson. Never forget Neal Stephenson.
-
Can't believe I missed this the first time
But I can hardly call it a quality game if I spent less than 20 hours in it
Portal says hi.
Then I would suggest you're reading the wrong books.
Dude, he didn't like Hyperion. He must hate fun.
-
Depends. Hyperion, while very good, is blemished by Endymion. The sequel was bad enough to make the original bad retroactively.
-
I blame Square Enix for turning Final Fantasy into a mediocre series. That's one of the reasons why I don't care much about gaming news unless they're about an Ace Combat game I can buy.
I wonder if the FPS genre will die one day, it's overwhelming presence is a bit disturbing if you ask me. Gaming is surprisingly oligotypical nowadays.
-
Portal says hi.
Hello
I have spent about four hours watching that game, but have never played it myself so it can't be that bad. It is one of the more original titles recently. By the way, that twenty hours includes the replays too. If I'm not interested enough to play again, well... Again, I believe that Portal was originally supposed to actually be in Half-Life 2, but was cut since the game play would have changed so much.
-
So the overwhelming vibe I'm getting is that you haven't played or read any of the stuff you're complaining about.
I see an easy solution here. I'll leave it as an exercise to the reader.
Your rant about books is symptomatic. We don't get epics any more, we get popcorn novels! Authors aren't writing with something to say! Meanwhile you've got R. Scott Bakker making his brutal philosophical points over there, you've got Iain Banks delivering epics on the nature of reality over there, you've got Richard Morgan unleashing his rage on the injustice of society over there, you've got George R. R. Martin producing these vast intricate opuses over there...
In the time it's taken you to complain in this thread you could've googled for good modern authors and gotten something to read.
-
By the way, introduce FS2 to your friend who has been playing consoles the last couple of years. Let him play through the training missions and see how many times he fails (my friend failed twice, once for touching the controls when told not to do so and the second time in missile evasion). Then let him play the first mission at the Normal difficulty. My friend died three times on the first head on fight on the first mission and gave up!
Boy I was surprised to see that! I would think avoiding the shots would be self-evident, but for some reason that thought didn't cross his mind.
It makes some sense if he is used to modern FPSs, which usually have slow movement and hitscan weapons that cannot be dodged. The emphasis on movement and dodging in FPSs fell away when they went from arena-style combat to the semi-realistic style we see today.
-
So the overwhelming vibe I'm getting is that you haven't played or read any of the stuff you're complaining about.
I see an easy solution here. I'll leave it as an exercise to the reader.
Huh? The whole point of the thread is that the modern stuff isn't interesting!
Answer me this question: How many ****ty modern books or games would I need to buy until I would be allowed to call them **** in your eyes? Ten, twenty? The old proverb goes, if it looks like ****, smells like **** and feels like ****, it probably is ****.
Your rant about books is symptomatic. We don't get epics any more, we get popcorn novels! Authors aren't writing with something to say! Meanwhile you've got R. Scott Bakker making his brutal philosophical points over there, you've got Iain Banks delivering epics on the nature of reality over there, you've got Richard Morgan unleashing his rage on the injustice of society over there, you've got George R. R. Martin producing these vast intricate opuses over there...
In the time it's taken you to complain in this thread you could've googled for good modern authors and gotten something to read.
Where did you come to that conclusion that I don't read modern authors - how could I otherwise complain about modern literature? By my own standards, I wouldn't have any justification. Of the authors you listed, only Martin is interesting to me. But even Martin isn't up to par when compared against what I used to read. There are some modern historic novels by Iggulden and Cornwell too, while good, simply cannot be compared to the older stuff. Pratchett has been able to mix some thought into comedy in his books, they are imaginative and sometimes start to surface philosophical questions, but never dare to go deep enough, probably to keep the comic appearance. George Orwell has plenty of good material that has depth, not only his books, but his reviews and short stories too. But he can't be considered modern author.
And why do you think I don't read book recommendations or reviews? I constantly find I need to read the reviews in my native language, that seems to be the only reliable way. Yes society and background are important factors here. Here's a couple of questions for you to answer by yourself:
- How many times have you been infuriated by the stupidity of the protagonist?
- How many times have you find a situation in a book that makes even you manliest men (of the men) laugh and cry at the same time?
- How many times has a book really made you depressed?
- How many times has this happened in a single book?
-
By the way, Scalzi's Old Man's War sounds amusing, but it remains to be seen whether I consider that exceptional book. I'll take a look at it if I can find the translated version. The same applies at least for Stephenson's Anathem. At this age I realize one thing: the best sci-fi books I have read discussed the possibility of something what could be happening now or in the near future. Modern sci-fi seems to be aiming further away, and when looking back at sci-fi books 20 years ago, I don't remember them that well compared to the sci-fi books that applied to near future.
-
But it's true too. I haven't read that much science fiction, and it is not a large factor in the whole broad range of literature. I even put the sci-fi books I have read for you to see and compare. If there is a book that is better than those I listed, I'd like to read it too. But as with gaming, I think there is something odd about the current authors if I find books written hundred years ago considerably better than the new releases. Computers should ease up writing of truly epic novels, but what we actually get is more pop-corn kind of books. I can't escape the feeling that the former books were written because the writer wanted to tell something - it might have been a general philosophical argument of something in life, or just human nature itself. Current books are more about writing for writing's sake, i.e. to keep the author alive. I don't mean that I would despise their work of researching the backgrounds or minute details, but it seems that the books aren't in any ways touching any more. That is to say, the heart is missing.
Here you are, making a very broad, very generalized statement about a subject that GB (as an SF writer) has something of a stake in. Don't be surprised if the answer you get is a bit on the harsh side.
Also, if you honestly believe that current writers are only in it for the money, you really haven't talked to many writers.
By the way, Scalzi's Old Man's War sounds amusing, but it remains to be seen whether I consider that exceptional book. I'll take a look at it if I can find the translated version. The same applies at least for Stephenson's Anathem. At this age I realize one thing: the best sci-fi books I have read discussed the possibility of something what could be happening now or in the near future. Modern sci-fi seems to be aiming further away, and when looking back at sci-fi books 20 years ago, I don't remember them that well compared to the sci-fi books that applied to near future.
Near-Future SF is alive and kicking, and there's some very interesting stuff happening there. Charles Stross' Halting State, Richard Morgans' Market Forces, or Neal Stephensons' Cryptonomicon should be on or at least near your reading list. Personally, I'd say that near-future SF is as big or maybe even bigger than the Far-future, space opera stuff.
-
Yeah, clearly no grounding in modern trends. The whole lens of SF has been moving closer and closer to the present over the past decades, and that movement has been formalized as Vinge's Singularity concept. Gibson stopped writing stuff in the future and started writing stuff in the present day because everything he wrote came true.
Check back in when you're caught up with what's actually happening.
-
By the way, introduce FS2 to your friend who has been playing consoles the last couple of years. Let him play through the training missions and see how many times he fails (my friend failed twice, once for touching the controls when told not to do so and the second time in missile evasion). Then let him play the first mission at the Normal difficulty. My friend died three times on the first head on fight on the first mission and gave up! :lol:
Boy I was surprised to see that! I would think avoiding the shots would be self-evident, but for some reason that thought didn't cross his mind.
Oh God, it's true. :P
I had a friend back when I went to Embry who was quite into FPS games like Half-Life, and could not wrap his head around FS1. It didn't help that his laptop didn't have a numeric pad, but he pretty much just rage quit after a few tries at the training missions. Somehow following simple instructions or customizing your keymap is hard...
On the bright side, I guess I should be a bit proud - I wowed him into trying it while flying an Athena and ripping Shivan fighters to pieces with Avenger cannons and dumbfire rockets. More impressively, this was Vanilla FS1, not the port.
Lastly, if my suggestion was interesting to you, Mika, here's Spiderweb's site:
http://www.spiderwebsoftware.com/
If you're curious to try something, just find a demo. :D
-
Geez, that's pitiful. I managed to beat FS1 a few times over when I was six (same for FS2) :<
-
Indeed Hades, indeed...
...But he was very proficient at Portal.
-
I can't speak for the sci-fi side of things, since I'm not exactly well-read there, but Mika, a lot of your complaints about gaming seem to come in the form of holding up games as a whole to hardcore combat flight sims, which were a niche segment of a niche genre even when they were somewhat more prevalent. Comparing vastly different genres, or even vastly different levels of the same genre, simply doesn't make any sense; holding up something like Ace Combat to Falcon 4.0 tells you about as little as holding up a crazy-complex RPG like Baldur's Gate to Super Mario RPG. It's an apples-to-doorknobs comparison. I think what you may not realize is that games at the accessibility level of a Falcon 4.0 simply won't ever get a massive audience; hell, I've been playing games for the majority of my life, in all different genres, and I don't think I'd be interested in such a game myself. What may seem ideal for you simply doesn't work for the vast majority of people out there; that's just a simple fact of life.
On a related note, there's a great video series on The Escapist called "Extra Credit" that dedicated a recent episode (http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/extra-credits/2454-Easy-Games) to the common complaint about modern games being "too easy." I pretty much completely agree with the main point the video makes, that games should strive to be as accessible as possible up-front, yet contain a great deal of depth as you delve into them. It's often said that chess is a game that takes a minute to learn, but a lifetime to master...the same concept can be applied to video games as well. Flinging a player straight into a game that requires them to manage dozens of controls and systems that they can only master after reading a hundred-page manual represents flat-out bad game design. Getting the player acclimated to the game environment at first is a good thing, as it provides encouragement for early progress and teaches the player the skill set they'll need to progress. Portal is perhaps the ultimate example of a brilliant game tutorial in action: each concept is introduced in turn, and before the player knows it, they're able to pull off crazy-complicated maneuvers without batting an eye. This is the sort of thing that the game industry should be shooting for if they want more and more people to share in our favorite pastime.
(Oh, and as the video notes, even games which appear extremely simple may hide amazing depth once you start to poke around. The Pokemon series, games that six-year-olds could ostensibly pick up and understand, has this crazy-complex set of character attribute and breeding rules that literally requires mountains of spreadsheets to puzzle out. And the brilliance of it is that a player never has to touch any of it to beat the game if they don't want to.)
-
Games these days are...cliche. There's a lot of duplicates out there, and the problem is everyone thinks they're original by creating yet another FPS...except it all boils down to "bad guys pop up and you kill them". Chalk a lot of it up to us (really the people who grew up with the very first games that actually weren't **** - like Doom, Command & Conquer, Half Life, Freespace 2, etc) growing older and just getting tired with seeing the same stuff over and over again. If you think about it, there's a lot of kids out there who are just getting into gaming and they don't even have a conception of what games are like - Halo, COD, etc, are all "holy **** I've never seen this before" whereas for a lot of us we've seen it all done before. That doesn't necessarily mean either is bad (well, except for COD/Madden/Halo/Final Fantasy clones which are just basically reskinning the same game over and over again (also read: every single Japanese RPG) - THAT is frustrating), it just means that we have to find more interesting stuff. The problem is really that the game industry has been taken over by the mainstream, so most of the "big boys" only go for this massive market, whereas most of the indie crowd think, and I actually read this on a forum on Gamedev.net: "...indie games don't have the resources to do anything unique or creative, so I'm going to just do the best modern shooter I can".
Back when a lot of us were growing up, the overhead for what was considered a "good" game was a lot lower - it was more about the gameplay than the graphics. Since most people react to "pretty" more so than deep gameplay (especially on a console where the latter is extremely hard to do because of the limited controls), that's what everyone goes straight to when they think of what a "good" game is. Indie games are starting to make a resurgence, but again people just kind of don't do 3D unless they can do it super-duper amazing with normal maps/bump maps on every bead of sweat on each individual character's face - so all we get are boring platformers that are just REALLY old formulas recycled with an interesting twist (BRAID).
tl;dr; games aren't getting more boring, you're just getting older. Unfortunately no one out there is making unique stuff for us to enjoy because most of our generation is getting into the industry and instead of forming their own studios, they're going to work for the big ones because that's what college and parents and everyone older than them has told them that's what they need to do to be successful. I.e. if you don't come up with a million dollar idea in college you're doomed to work in whatever job your degree entitles you to for the rest of your life.
If you want to see more interesting games, make them yourself. You know what the best part is? All these younger folks today will be blown away by the older games. I showed my gf (freshman in college now) Freespace 2, and she was blown away by how complex it was and how good the voice acting was. That being said, the controls really are too complex and really are too stupid. Games are getting more streamlined and easier to understand when it comes to manipulating them - that doesn't mean the gameplay elements have to get simpler.
-
Unfortunately no one out there is making unique stuff for us to enjoy
Portal says hi
-
Unfortunately no one out there is making unique stuff for us to enjoy
Portal says hi
WHOA.
WHOA.
HOLD UP.
I MADE A GENERALIZATION.
AND I WAS WRONG IN A SPECIFIC INSTANCE.
WHOA.
Btw, you also forgot Left 4 Dead, Team Fortress 2, Audiosurf, Mass Effect 1 + 2, any racing game by Codemasters, Wings of Prey and more.
Do you feel smarter now, though? You totally destroyed my argument.
-
Answer me this question: How many ****ty modern books or games would I need to buy until I would be allowed to call them **** in your eyes? Ten, twenty? The old proverb goes, if it looks like ****, smells like **** and feels like ****, it probably is ****.
Do you honestly believe that the proportion of ****ty to excellent books wasn't just as overwhelming in the Good Old Days?
The funny thing about consuming old media is you rarely hear about the mediocre or the forgettable ones. I wonder why that is.
-
Then, of course, there's a new Touhou release at least once a year... but that's kind of a niche here in America. Meh, whatever. They're fun games with clever dialogue and awesome music.
:wtf: :wtf: :wtf: :wtf:
Touhou is the work of the Devil
-
Do you feel smarter now, though? You totally destroyed my argument.
Yes, and I think you did that yourself, respectively.
Incidentally, characterizing indie gaming as being all about platformers is odd. Whatever your genre of choice, the odds are good there's a strong indie showing in it.
-
Do you feel smarter now, though? You totally destroyed my argument.
Yes, and I think you did that yourself, respectively.
Incidentally, characterizing indie gaming as being all about platformers is odd. Whatever your genre of choice, the odds are good there's a strong indie showing in it.
Cheers boopseekins :-3
-
Touhou is the work of the Devil
(http://i480.photobucket.com/albums/rr163/NinjaShade_04/giving_a_damn-1.gif)
-
Again, I love indie games, and I can't think of any platformers that I play.
If I want to get a hold of a wargame, I'll go play Combat Mission. Battlefront.com is amazing... I've already noted my choice in RPGs...
I do confess that a lot of the other games I play are based off the work of larger, more stable studios. FreeSpace is an obvious example, as is FreeFalcon. Of course, there's a few things I make use of now which are from companies that used to be "indie" which are now much more in the spotlight - X-Plane is a great example.
Being an indie title doesn't limit one to mediocrity by far - if I had the nerve to stomach playing Penumbra myself, I'd do it! Though, as I've said, I can't seem to have the guts to play it, after watching Let's Plays of it on the net... damn son... Excellent visuals, sound, physics, storywriting - it was like watching a film - a very creepy one. And even if it's not my style, it represents what indie games ought to be and often are - innovative, cerberal, and thoughtfully crafted.
-
I don't know about catching up the sci-fi trend with the books you guys recommended, by a brief survey they don't seem to get that good ratings here. Of the sci-fi authors listed, only Stephenson's books are recommended. But don't worry, I have noticed this trend before in other fields of literature so it's nothing new for me. I'll pick up Stephenson's Anathem if I can find it. It seems to get the best ratings, and the synopsis itself seems interesting. Gibson's current writing style and themes sound average to me, so I'll skip that. I could read Neuromancer if I get a chance to find it from the bookstore. I might check Morgan's Market Forces too, even though the plot is said to be lacking in there. And as a side note, Battuta is not the only writer here.
Logic tells me that the published books had to be better earlier. The reason is simple: it took a lot more work to write one. So yes, there has probably been many bad books before, but the ratio between good and bad ones is becoming worse nowadays.
Back to gaming then, what should we think of the new players who find Freespace too complex? Do you think it is so?
Unknown Target, I think your first post summed quite a lot of things that I feel. It was a good one! The reason I'm saying the games are too easy nowadays is because I think they are too easy, not because they don't have good tutorials or that they have deep mechanics. If I can solve puzzles just by looking at them (no to need use brain), then they are too easy. Unfortunately, the preferences of the majority seem to disagree with me. Which is the reason why I started the topic and asked if other people from the same generation feel the same. I wonder if the guys now at their 40s felt the same around 2000...
If you want to see more interesting games, make them yourself.
I was afraid you'd say that :lol: But on the otherhand it is also true. Mods start to look more and more interesting.
-
I forgot, it was funny that the Escapist clip had World of Goo as an example of easy accessibility. I can concur with that. It is original and vivid game with a non-existent learning curve.
But it was also too short and too easy. In this case (oh the irony), I hope they make a longer and slightly harder sequel.
-
Logic tells me that the published books had to be better earlier. The reason is simple: it took a lot more work to write one. So yes, there has probably been many bad books before, but the ratio between good and bad ones is becoming worse nowadays.
Wrong statement is incredibly wrong. As was pointed out earlier, the reason why older books seem better is because the vast majority of old books isn't around anymore. Only the very best books have survived and get recommended, all the mediocre stuff simply gets forgotten. Just because it might have been more physically exerting to write books doesn't make them better.
But it's probably no use to point it out again. Arguing against someone who is already pretty set in the "old == better" mindset is useless. Seriously.
-
I forgot, it was funny that the Escapist clip had World of Goo as an example of easy accessibility. I can concur with that. It is original and vivid game with a non-existent learning curve.
But it was also too short and too easy. In this case (oh the irony), I hope they make a longer and slightly harder sequel.
So wait, you got the OCDs for every one of them within a reasonable time frame?
-
Logic tells me that the published books had to be better earlier. The reason is simple: it took a lot more work to write one. So yes, there has probably been many bad books before, but the ratio between good and bad ones is becoming worse nowadays.
See above for demolition.
-
I demand stats regarding books.
-
Stats here from my country:
http://www.stat.fi/tup/suomi90/huhtikuu_en.html
I'll reply tomorrow for the "demolition". Early wakeup on morning, so gotta go to sleep.
-
Personal opinion about the overall quality of books:
It's dropping because everyone can write a book nowadays... it didn't use to be a common practice for the gross majority of the population until a few decades ago (probably less). The profile of the typical writer has changed a lot.
-
I'll admit my zest for gaming is on a down turn. Not because of any real or imagined drop in quality of gaming, but rather I simply enjoy doing other things more nowadays. My week's booked with martial arts, horseback riding, running and cooking. I really don't have much time for it, and even when I do find the time it generally only holds my interest for an hour or so. To be honest I don't much care for television either. Aside from the news, football and Castle the TV remains off most of the week. I dunno, for me there's more interesting things to accomplish right now then gaming.
-
Personal opinion about the overall quality of books:
It's dropping because everyone can write a book nowadays... it didn't use to be a common practice for the gross majority of the population until a few decades ago (probably less). The profile of the typical writer has changed a lot.
No. If anything getting published by a real house has become harder. Writing no longer pays any money for 95% of writers.
-
Back to gaming then, what should we think of the new players who find Freespace too complex? Do you think it is so?
I think it could certainly be considered as such, from a certain point of view. Keep in mind that FreeSpace represents a type of control interface that simply isn't all that common anymore. Flight sims have always been something of a niche genre, and we know that space sims are all but extinct. Even the more complicated of PC titles today, like your MMOs and regular RPGs, have much of the control interface handled via on-screen menus and prompts. In contrast, FS requires handling a wide array of keyboard controls (unless you have an uber HOTAS setup, but who does?), and for someone who isn't used to that, I can imagine it seeming very overwhelming at first. I had the benefit myself of playing Descent before I found FS, but even that was a decent step up in control complexity.
Also, going along with the video I posted, I don't think FS's tutorial system is all that ideal in the grand scheme of things. There are several very useful ship functions that never get touched on in the training missions, while a few commands that don't come up all that much are explained. (I know I've just about never used match speed outside of the tutorial mission. :p) To add to that, the tutorials are, quite frankly, intensely boring, as they're completely removed from the storyline and comprise three missions in a row of drudgery. They're essentially the anti-Portal, as it were. If :v: were making FS today, I think the tutorial system is something that they'd definitely revisit.
-
Personal opinion about the overall quality of books:
It's dropping because everyone can write a book nowadays... it didn't use to be a common practice for the gross majority of the population until a few decades ago (probably less). The profile of the typical writer has changed a lot.
Your statement works against itself. It's true that there are more people writing books these days, but like Battuta said that only makes things harder. Publishing a book isn't a small endeavour; between editing, typesetting, advertising, printing and probably other costs I don't know about, publishers have a ceiling for the number of works they can feasibly publish in a given year. More submissions means more competition. If anything the standard has risen, not lowered.
Which brings us to Mika's earlier remark about modern authors only writing to stay alive, which - given how wildly difficult it is to even make a living writing fiction, let alone a decent living - is probably the most ridiculous idea this thread has produced yet. It was actually far more plausible about a century ago.
-
Before this thread turns into a thread about books, let me just say that I sort off agree that games aren't as innovative as they used to be.
Also I got neverwinter nights off gog.
-
Logic tells me that the published books had to be better earlier. The reason is simple: it took a lot more work to write one. So yes, there has probably been many bad books before, but the ratio between good and bad ones is becoming worse nowadays.
Are you kidding me? Look at classic literature - in the days of Swift, Doyle, Wilde, Austen, and others, virtually anyone could get virtually anything published if their work was even moderately worth reading. For one, a lot fewer people could even read and write to begin with, which narrowed your audience somewhat. Second, most published works came out in series in pamphlets, newspapers, magazines, and other periodicals - true novels, in the 500+ page sense of the word, are a relatively new invention (even religious texts were frequently published in parts).
At any given time, there are literally thousands of authors with material worth reading in circulation - yet historically, we remember perhaps only a few dozen authors from each era. And as others have mentioned, there is a good reason for that - only those with works that stood the test of time have survived to present day.
Your reference point is the problem here. There was a lot less published in terms of overall volume in the past than in the present, but publishing was open to a much wider proportion of the population, and publishers tended to be more prolific in their sense of variety (fewer copies, a great deal more material). But, relatively little of the sheer volume of authors has survived - that which history deems worthy of passing down.
Your quote just indicates to me that you have a pretty poor grasp of the history of the written word in general.
-
For one, a lot fewer people could even read and write to begin with [...] but publishing was open to a much wider proportion of the population...
Am I the only one who sees a contradiction here?
-
Yes.
Audience lower, but more comparatively more people could publish. The terms are not related except by the trade in which they are employed.
-
Finding a good sci-fi book requires time, patience, and a library card. I'll usually read (or start reading) five or six book before I find one that sticks with me. The hardest part is not judging the book by its cover, since that's all I'm doing when I pick it off the shelf.
As for video games, if you get tired of playing them then build them. Modding provides an something engaging that playing them doesn't.
-
There's a possibly-true factoid whispered about at workshops - writers today make the exact same amount they did in 1910, not adjusted for inflation. If you made ten cents then, you make ten cents now for the same amount of work.
Considering what ten cents was worth then vs. what it's worth now...yeah, that's why writing doesn't pay.
-
That statement could probably be extended towards most forms of art. I expect most serious artists live at or around the poverty line.
-
Seriously(!) guys,
I don't even know how to begin with. Thinking how to even start this post was demanding.
Let me start by asking you a very simple question: how many of you have written more than 100 pages with a typewriter? Or, say, more than twenty pages by hand, taking meticulous care of the linguistics? Or written a letter by hand for someone you don't know very well, yet you felt that you had something that worth wile to say that the letter was more than justified in your eyes? What I think is that if you haven't done any of that, you can't possibly understand the amount of work required. How could you? The other thing to consider is that the typewriters were not exactly cheap either. If you go even further back in the history, the amount of people who were able to read and write was lower, and being able to do so usually signified higher education, and getting through that also happened to require being able to produce stylized and clear text. And as like in the Army, some things in the Education don't die quickly. Even I had to take such a test in order to demonstrate that I really can write linguistically correct, clear and understandable Finnish text with good amount of information content. It would be a serious blow for me if such tests are not any more instated elsewhere. There was even one incident that I just recalled, back then when I was sitting as a student chair in the faculty of Science, there was a close call for a hand written Maturity Test being rejected due to bad language skills. I can assure you that the older professors were and still are a lot more strict on what it comes to the correctness of language and even stylistic issues.
The next point is that you think that yesterday authors were lucky to live in a situation where they could publish almost anything. Not so, at least in here. Have you ever read the corrections for the texts written in 1950s? Or the required stylistic changes by the editors? I recall that the United States of America banned one novel that I mentioned earlier because it contained "too graphic content"; the content being close to a medical description of the work of an Egyptian embalmer, and how to prepare the late Pharaoh for the rest of eternity. This kind of banning simply does not happen today in Western Countries. But if nowadays books were sent to past, I think not many of them would ever be published without significant changes. And to take the thought a little bit further, how would those much toted cyberpunk books survive had the strong words and violence been neutered?
Then let's discuss about the publishers themselves. You are talking about books being expensive to publish and that there is natural selection pressure that will favor good books due to large amount of hopeful writers. This is not true, and it would be clear to you had you lead the thought even a little bit further. Even in the statistics link I posted it is clearly stated that the expenses caused by book publishing are less than they used to be, a clear written statement which should be quite visible and I expect of you that you do not miss such an important sentence next time. I confess I can't possibly imagine how valuable a book was in the 1600s. The second point to understand is that the publishing companies focus on the books that they think will sell well, which is not by itself any sort of guarantee of quality. Personally, I think that almost guarantees the opposite, for it is controversy, scandals, mudslinging and revelations that are quite popular today.
So, writing earlier was definitely not easy because of the technology, publishing was much more expensive and the average readers were used to and required higher literature standards - be it novels or non-fiction books. And one should add on top of that the rather high censoring policy of the publishers. What it comes to earlier writers getting more money, writing has never been a kind of job where everybody gets rich - which sometimes is just being at the right place at the right time. My personal opinion is that if writer cannot nowadays get his work published, his writing, to put it bluntly, sucks.
Just because something looks simple and sounds reasonable, the reality might still beg to differ. While throwing rather heated comments about the stupidity of mine, take a look at the this text and think again if it could have been written by a stupid, ignorant person. Now, I have taken my time to enjoy you with this reply and expect similar standards from you. I'm eagerly awaiting for your hate mail, but with great sorrow I have to say I likely will not be able to respond until tomorrow evening or the day after tomorrow. Last thing to mention is that I'm fully aware that different people think that different kinds of books are good. We go by the majority and that has started to cause problems for me in finding books that I consider good, which is the original topic in this thread.
-
Yeah, I feel everything you asserted in that post is superficially reasonable but ultimately not applicable to the realities of publishing. Industries are shrinking, standards are up, getting published is harder and unlike in the days of yore you can't make a living selling by volume any more. This post (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=72843.msg1439670#msg1439670) makes the point nicely. The statistics you linked do nothing to contradict any of it.
I'll summarize your argument for ya:
-Writing on a typewriter is hard! Indeed. Thank goodness we have improved technology today so we can spend effort on things that actually matter, instead of painstaking technical hurdles. The laborious nature of writing on a typewriter or by hand does not guarantee any increase in quality; if anything it is responsible for many of the difficulties older manuscripts faced.
-There was more censorship in the past! Indeed. Lucky we don't have to deal with that **** any more. Also lucky that good authors were still able to talk about very disturbing things if they needed to. Censorship is anathema to good literature.
-Costs of publishing are down! Maybe, but irrelevant when the revenue is shrinking faster. The American SF publishing industry is contracting in most sectors; literature and literary SF and fantasy are both far more selective. It's harder to get published by a legitimate, reputable house these days. I don't know how it's working out for the British School.
-Readers had higher standards! Not so, judging by the trash that got published back then. Sturgeon's Law holds then as it did now. In fact almost every book in the SF sector published in the era between the 1900s and the...1970s, I'd say at a guess, would be a laughingstock today. The survivors of that era are what you hold up as classics, but you're ignoring the enormous morass of crap that was produced by the 'Golden Age'.
In fact, authors today have such higher standards that they famously attacked a publisher which claimed to have quality standards but didn't (http://www.amazon.com/Atlanta-Nights-Travis-Tea/dp/1411622987), simply by writing intentional crap in the mold of old pulp.
You provided a nice refutation of your own points right here:
What it comes to earlier writers getting more money, writing has never been a kind of job where everybody gets rich - which sometimes is just being at the right place at the right time. My personal opinion is that if writer cannot nowadays get his work published, his writing, to put it bluntly, sucks.
Indeed. Unlike in the past, people who suck find it hard to get published these days. This is why the rejection rate for would-be authors is up so high; standards have improved. This is why the self-publishing industry has had such success. This is also why the general quality of SF lit at the elite level has increased. Failures or the mediocre now go into media SF or to specialty houses like Baen.
The brutal fact is that people looking to go into SF or fantasy publication are taught to expect 350-400 rejections before selling a single short story. Just one. That kind of rejection rate was not as commonplace back in the gee-whiz nuclear-rockets 40s and 50s.
I understand your argument, that submission volume is up, but I think you're out of touch with the realities of the publishing industry. It is a shrinking sector that only allows a few elites to survive and presents massive barriers to entry. The only way to get in is either to be really good, really lucky, or to go into media tie-ins or paranormal romance. As a result, the ratio of **** to gold is probably better than it has been in some time.
Make no mistake: in general the industry is dying, and only the strong survive. When I spend time at SFWA functions, most of the old guard are writers who would never be published in today's climes. The rare newcomers are young, strong writers (Ted Chiang; Cat Valente; many others) who are several cuts above.
All in all what I think we have here is a classic case of the 'good old days' bias. Summed up nicely by our subject:
Personally, I think that almost guarantees the opposite, for it is controversy, scandals, mudslinging and revelations that are quite popular today.
The most superficial grasp of history would tell you that this is exactly how things have been for decades. Centuries, really.
-
Yeah I gotta agree with battuta, the difficulties inherent with typewriters and or manual pen and ink writing, coupled with grammar OCD does not superior writing make. Writing code in Fortran with punchcards was certainly difficult, and also required a extreme level of correctness, but that certainly doesn't form any basis for arguing it as being superior to the capabilities of current programing languages.
-
I'm kind of despondent right now because I've been banging out a manuscript for a month and now I realize that it's unusably long. :( Anything over 100k gets tossed out immediately by slush readers, and I'm bumping up on 90 without making a significant dent in the plot.
****.
-
As for video games, if you get tired of playing them then build them. Modding provides an something engaging that playing them doesn't.
Not to de(re?)-rail the current topic, but while that's certainly an option for creative types, keep in mind that there are many of us out there who are simply not. :p I know I'd never be able to put together a coherent mod of anything myself.
-
Well, you never know...
Get on a team and start doing something. :yes:
-
the average readers were used to and required higher literature standards - be it novels or non-fiction books.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dime_novel
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penny_dreadful
-
Well, you never know...
Get on a team and start doing something. :yes:
No, see, you're missing my point. :p I don't doubt that I could learn the technical skills acquired to join a modding team...what I lack are the creative skills to do so. I see members of this community whip up ridiculously awesome ship designs, or gorgeous textures, or top-notch mission writing, and I stand and applaud them because I don't have any of the same creative impulses flying around in my head. I imagine I'm not the only member of that group, either. I think it's something that a lot of creative types have a bit of difficulty grasping, that there are those of us who can't put pen to paper and draw forth stories and pictures out of the blue. It's an enviable gift.
-
Even imagination takes practice. :)
-
Yeah, I'm more in the camp of 'not enough time/motivation to learn the technical skills' as opposed to the creative one, I think up crazy stuff frequently and easily.
so exact opposite problem.
-
We need to combine our powarz and become Super Modder. :p
-
Even imagination takes practice. :)
Anyone who has spent much time around amateur fiction set will tell you this is a lie. Very few people actually improve measurably over time, particularly in a way unrelated to their growing older. If you were 20 and writing garbage five years ago, you're almost certainly writing garbage now. Absent external pressure, people don't typically get better at their craft. (And it can even happen in a professional capacity after a writer has secured a wide audience: they often deteriorate. One could also point to Halo: Reach for an example of professional quality going south if tempted.)
The only reason I even think I have improved in the last five years is that I have an unrelated but highly educational fascination with how and why you do things wrong.
-
I think Reach had a new lead writer.
-
Thanks Mongoose and NGTM-1R; for your comments about creativity are right on spot. I would be tempted to say everybody has an equal chance of doing arts, but on the other hand I also know that a lot of people weren't born for it and would feel like lying if I did so. The question is should the hopeful be discouraged or encouraged? That one can admit to himself that he probably never can become a writer or any artist is also a feat in itself, wisdom even. Perhaps you will find the suitable art some day, for arts too are an integral part of life! Being a participant in any form of arts is not just research and knowledge, on the contrary, it is far more that cannot be put in words. Such things one will not find in libraries nor in Universities for there is no school that could teach it. Only those born in a suitable situation in a community at the right time can truly become great writers, otherwise the path they take will lead to mediocrity at best. There just is no way to write of something of which they have no experience. For how could one write about the snowy, windy coldness of Planet Hoth without having experienced cold himself? The frozen eye-lashes that cast a white shadow on everything one sees, the lying frozen toes and fingers that say it is not cold any more, or the wind with icy shards that make the skin tingle? How could they possibly write about creatures that float in the atmosphere of a gas giant planet without having soared themselves? Feel the the hot convections under you, or the gentle, invisible force supporting you while gliding through the skies!
Make no mistake, I do not consider mediocrity in itself as a bad thing as it will always be part of life, even in myself - there is bound to be somebody who sees something that I do as sub-par, even some tiniest details. For me, it is the lack of the the truly great pieces of art that disturbs me while we are supposed to be living the best of the times and have all the resources and technology to make it happen, yet it still feels like echoing-ing-ing the great words of those who were earlier. Those who had a way of dressing their deepest feelings and thoughts so elegantly to words so effortlessly through any cultural or linguistical barriers and continue to do so throughout history, had a burning passion inside them to write. To write of their experiences and what they saw since they were born to see and listen to the world differently and were treated as such. Such was that passion that even the difficulty of methods to deliver their thoughts did not discourage them; the stories just happened, whether it was the fingers carrying a pencil or hitting the keystrokes of a typewriter. Perhaps they never were good making speeches or were treated otherwise unfairly, but the human desire of telling something to others does not go away that easily! And the person who does not talk is very good at listening. Understanding something of the human nature is the key to mastering art of writing, but no amount of studying can give that understanding. One cannot describe the self-satisfied smugness experienced after beating someone in a fair game or fight, even after having warned the opponent about the outcome, unless one hasn't actually experienced it. For this is the reason why the memorable stories must always contain a part of the writer himself.
Through centuries writings were controlled, since a lot of people felt something was wrong but lacked the evidence. Now that there was a written word of it, that feeling became knowledge, and with knowledge becomes resolution. The masses became angry due to writings of early protestants in Germany; thousands of peasants died in rebellions that were ultimately in vain, while seeking only justice, fairness in treatment and just the being able to feed their families. But say a wrong word in a wrong place, you lose your head! Writing is a powerful tool, and simple words resonate within the people, but this requires sophistication. One can adore the beauty of simple expressions, laugh at the contrived adjectives and images, or feel anger towards the ugly rape of literature. Nevertheless, single words are the key here, but repeat one of them too much and all their meaning and power is lost! Constructing a book in a way that the writer can upset the reader in a well calculated manner in a single chapter is a start, but being able to do so continuously without thinking, just writing it, is a level that few ever achieve. Only a few books can shatter the world of the reader so utterly that he becomes depressed, yet still being a great delight to read. Doing that does not need a plot construct that is based on shock value or detailed torture depictions, it is all about understanding of how human thinks and feels. Indeed one cannot help but wonder how do they do that. And just as easily they change the style and write a story that works exactly in an opposite way.
Such texts cause the reader to wonder if the writer had lived through the times, and cannot escape the nagging feeling that everything in their texts is true and has likely happened. But the goal of writing something intentionally bad should never cross the mind of self-respecting writer, no matter how badly he feels his ego or rights have been violated. For in that particular instance they were lucky that the publisher did not accept the story and sell it as a learning device with great profit margins with a stamp of "written by the professionals" and ask for a sequel.
But what do I know, simple guy living under the Northern Star and just below the Arctic circle. I'm just an illiterate idiot who doesn't know the better truth is out there.
-
There just is no way to write of something of which they have no experience.
Whoops, better shut down the forums. FreeSpace is impossible!
But the goal of writing something intentionally bad should never cross the mind of self-respecting writer, no matter how badly he feels his ego or rights have been violated. For in that particular instance they were lucky that the publisher did not accept the story and sell it as a learning device with great profit margins with a stamp of "written by the professionals" and ask for a sequel.
The publisher did accept the story and sell it, which was what the writers expected to happen. The whole point of the Atlanta Nights exercise was that the publisher claimed to have standards but in fact did not; PublishAmerica was a self-publishing scam meant to hoodwink amateurs out of their money. Atlanta Nights demonstrated that PublishAmerica was a gang of criminal liars who never read a single word of what they accepted and published.
Or do you think that shutting down scams is a bad use of the written word?
-
Only those born in a suitable situation in a community at the right time can truly become great writers, otherwise the path they take will lead to mediocrity at best. There just is no way to write of something of which they have no experience. For how could one write about the snowy, windy coldness of Planet Hoth without having experienced cold himself? The frozen eye-lashes that cast a white shadow on everything one sees, the lying frozen toes and fingers that say it is not cold any more, or the wind with icy shards that make the skin tingle? How could they possibly write about creatures that float in the atmosphere of a gas giant planet without having soared themselves? Feel the the hot convections under you, or the gentle, invisible force supporting you while gliding through the skies!
"Write what you know" is an old adage.
It's also not entirely correct, and definitely not a rule one should slavishly follow; In the end, that's what test readers who know the stuff you are writing about are for. And even then, ultimately, realism will most often take a back seat to narrative necessity.
Make no mistake, I do not consider mediocrity in itself as a bad thing as it will always be part of life, even in myself - there is bound to be somebody who sees something that I do as sub-par, even some tiniest details. For me, it is the lack of the the truly great pieces of art that disturbs me while we are supposed to be living the best of the times and have all the resources and technology to make it happen, yet it still feels like echoing-ing-ing the great words of those who were earlier. Those who had a way of dressing their deepest feelings and thoughts so elegantly to words so effortlessly through any cultural or linguistical barriers and continue to do so throughout history, had a burning passion inside them to write. To write of their experiences and what they saw since they were born to see and listen to the world differently and were treated as such. Such was that passion that even the difficulty of methods to deliver their thoughts did not discourage them; the stories just happened, whether it was the fingers carrying a pencil or hitting the keystrokes of a typewriter. Perhaps they never were good making speeches or were treated otherwise unfairly, but the human desire of telling something to others does not go away that easily! And the person who does not talk is very good at listening. Understanding something of the human nature is the key to mastering art of writing, but no amount of studying can give that understanding. One cannot describe the self-satisfied smugness experienced after beating someone in a fair game or fight, even after having warned the opponent about the outcome, unless one hasn't actually experienced it. For this is the reason why the memorable stories must always contain a part of the writer himself.
Such eloquence.
Shame it's wasted on the dreary old "Oh no, everything's crap today" sentiment. What are you, 75? Get off your high horse and just try to get used to the fact (which has been pointed out numerous times) that you are suffering from hindsight bias. You look back, and see the great works (which have been made great by years and years of debate over the matter), you look to the present and see a bewildering array of unfiltered culture, which has yet to be firmly separated into "crap" and "classic".
Through centuries writings were controlled, since a lot of people felt something was wrong but lacked the evidence. Now that there was a written word of it, that feeling became knowledge, and with knowledge becomes resolution. The masses became angry due to writings of early protestants in Germany; thousands of peasants died in rebellions that were ultimately in vain, while seeking only justice, fairness in treatment and just the being able to feed their families. But say a wrong word in a wrong place, you lose your head! Writing is a powerful tool, and simple words resonate within the people, but this requires sophistication. One can adore the beauty of simple expressions, laugh at the contrived adjectives and images, or feel anger towards the ugly rape of literature. Nevertheless, single words are the key here, but repeat one of them too much and all their meaning and power is lost! Constructing a book in a way that the writer can upset the reader in a well calculated manner in a single chapter is a start, but being able to do so continuously without thinking, just writing it, is a level that few ever achieve. Only a few books can shatter the world of the reader so utterly that he becomes depressed, yet still being a great delight to read. Doing that does not need a plot construct that is based on shock value or detailed torture depictions, it is all about understanding of how human thinks and feels. Indeed one cannot help but wonder how do they do that. And just as easily they change the style and write a story that works exactly in an opposite way.
Such texts cause the reader to wonder if the writer had lived through the times, and cannot escape the nagging feeling that everything in their texts is true and has likely happened. But the goal of writing something intentionally bad should never cross the mind of self-respecting writer, no matter how badly he feels his ego or rights have been violated. For in that particular instance they were lucky that the publisher did not accept the story and sell it as a learning device with great profit margins with a stamp of "written by the professionals" and ask for a sequel.
**** off. Take your preachifying elsewhere.
But what do I know, simple guy living under the Northern Star and just below the Arctic circle. I'm just an illiterate idiot who doesn't know the better truth is out there.
Ohhhh, nice one. Trying to soften the blow by saying "I am just a humble know-nothing".
If you were truly convinced you knew nothing, if you truly were as humble as this last sentence wants me to believe, you wouldn't waste your time preaching about stuff you don't know anything about.
You are just rambling. You are not interested in debate, just in airing your opinions.
-
Wasn't this a thread about the game industry turning into the music industry?
-
Wasn't this a thread about the game industry turning into the music industry?
Meh, we whinge about the gaming industry enough. Arguing about literature is new and different, don't stifle the debate with on topicness :D
-
It's my own damn fault for picking out a single off-topic sentence and commenting on it. :p
-
:lol:
I suppose part of the problem is that, when you are young, it's all new, but as you grow older, and your experience of the world increases, the patterns of storytelling become more obvious, a million Odesseus' have sailed home from distant lands and faced a myriad of problems, thousands of Arthurs have pulled magical weapons that proclaim their birthright, hundreds of Hari Seldons have tried to save a Galactic federation using mathematical prediction and mind-powers and so forth. New scientific thinking may create new ways to tell those stories, but the stories themselves do not change.
Possibly that's where the new affection for blowing up cities and killing millions of people comes from in storytelling? Are heros becoming boring? There have always been anti-heros (Odesseus wasn't a particularly nice man if you think about it), but there is, to my mind, a growing sense of fatalism in storytelling.
-
:lol:
I suppose part of the problem is that, when you are young, it's all new, but as you grow older, and your experience of the world increases, the patterns of storytelling become more obvious, a million Odesseus' have sailed home from distant lands and faced a myriad of problems, thousands of Arthurs have pulled magical weapons that proclaim their birthright, hundreds of Hari Seldons have tried to save a Galactic federation using mathematical prediction and mind-powers and so forth. New scientific thinking may create new ways to tell those stories, but the stories themselves do not change.
Odd, that's almost exactly one of the things TVTropes says it does when it Ruins Your Life. (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TVTropesWillRuinYourLife)
-
Anyone who has spent much time around amateur fiction set will tell you this is a lie. Very few people actually improve measurably over time, particularly in a way unrelated to their growing older.
I want to say this has something to do with their being amateurs, but perhaps not.
Whoops, better shut down the forums. FreeSpace is impossible!
I'm loathe to take Mika's part, but I believe his meaning was that only exceptional people can successfully write about things with which they have no direct experience.
-
Humans learn and adapt. One might not be a great writer, but with enough effort and will, and even a small amount of talent, one can become one.
If you start from the assumption that we (our very thought patterns) are formed by our experiences, then we can indeed, change our own thought patterns, by guiding those experiences in ways we want. Hard, but doable.
-
WARNING: EPIC RANT IS REALLY ****ING EPIC.
Thanks Mongoose and NGTM-1R; for your comments about creativity are right on spot. I would be tempted to say everybody has an equal chance of doing arts, but on the other hand I also know that a lot of people weren't born for it and would feel like lying if I did so. The question is should the hopeful be discouraged or encouraged? That one can admit to himself that he probably never can become a writer or any artist is also a feat in itself, wisdom even. Perhaps you will find the suitable art some day, for arts too are an integral part of life! Being a participant in any form of arts is not just research and knowledge, on the contrary, it is far more that cannot be put in words. Such things one will not find in libraries nor in Universities for there is no school that could teach it. Only those born in a suitable situation in a community at the right time can truly become great writers, otherwise the path they take will lead to mediocrity at best. There just is no way to write of something of which they have no experience. For how could one write about the snowy, windy coldness of Planet Hoth without having experienced cold himself? The frozen eye-lashes that cast a white shadow on everything one sees, the lying frozen toes and fingers that say it is not cold any more, or the wind with icy shards that make the skin tingle? How could they possibly write about creatures that float in the atmosphere of a gas giant planet without having soared themselves? Feel the the hot convections under you, or the gentle, invisible force supporting you while gliding through the skies!
An art critic need not be able to draw. A doctor doesn't need to catch a disease to diagnose it. A writer need not go out and freeze half to death to describe it. If they're smart, they'll do some research on the subject first.
But in a larger sense, I am engaged every day in writing about things that I not only have not experienced, but cannot experience. I write about things that not only do not exist, but will not ever exist. But their impossibility is no barrier to their being described. You have to think, horror of horrors. Did you honestly believe that being a writer would be any less demanding upon the imagination that being a reader? Far from it.
Make no mistake, I do not consider mediocrity in itself as a bad thing as it will always be part of life, even in myself - there is bound to be somebody who sees something that I do as sub-par, even some tiniest details. For me, it is the lack of the the truly great pieces of art that disturbs me while we are supposed to be living the best of the times and have all the resources and technology to make it happen, yet it still feels like echoing-ing-ing the great words of those who were earlier. Those who had a way of dressing their deepest feelings and thoughts so elegantly to words so effortlessly through any cultural or linguistical barriers and continue to do so throughout history, had a burning passion inside them to write.
I've got news for you.
Shakespeare? He sucks, his work is incredibly forced and dependent on narrative causality over naturally coming together by good plotting and good characterization. (And he was writing about witches and Titania and Oberon, things which not only did not exist, but never existed.) Hemmingway, oh god, don't get me started about Papa, we'll be here all week. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle! He went through the authorial decay I described above, which was part of the reason Holmes took a header over Reichenbach Falls. (For that matter, Holmes was a druggie, and a detective, and Conan Doyle never was. So much for writing what you know.)
You have been conditioned, by your schooling, to accept these "great masters" as being truly great masters, to overlook their flaws. I went through the same thing, until I hit Hemmingway and violently rejected it. It was an eye-opening experience. A lot of the "great writers of the past" are actually quite awful and narrow in their appeal. We only read one story in all my English classes that everyone could agree on having universal appeal. It was...Phantoms, by Dean Koontz. He is universally regarded by serious literary critics of this day and age as writer of airport suspense stories of no literary value. But his characterization and plotting are undoubtedly superior to Shakespeare, his appeal to a much broader base.
To write of their experiences and what they saw since they were born to see and listen to the world differently and were treated as such. Such was that passion that even the difficulty of methods to deliver their thoughts did not discourage them; the stories just happened, whether it was the fingers carrying a pencil or hitting the keystrokes of a typewriter. Perhaps they never were good making speeches or were treated otherwise unfairly, but the human desire of telling something to others does not go away that easily! And the person who does not talk is very good at listening. Understanding something of the human nature is the key to mastering art of writing, but no amount of studying can give that understanding. One cannot describe the self-satisfied smugness experienced after beating someone in a fair game or fight, even after having warned the opponent about the outcome, unless one hasn't actually experienced it. For this is the reason why the memorable stories must always contain a part of the writer himself.
Lies. Lies and slander. Every first novel is the author as Jesus or Faust, but to continue in that mode is a terrible sign. And be wary of writing about issues close to home, it tends to burn you. I could go on for hours about people who got their Minority Warrior on in their fiction and what should have been a subtext became text and it went south like it was powered by Project Orion.
Also, I hear you say that it is impossible to write, to describe, a truly alien mindset. What you say is that you cannot write a human without being human; but that means you cannot write anything else without being it. No, no, a thousand times no! I summon Battuta with a Made of Meat link to defy thee. I speak of the Ender series' Buggers to refute thee. I throw my copy of Raptor Red in your face. I bury you beneath every story ever told about those who are not of this Earth. I demand you be sealed inside your dwelling with books about Dracula and Frankenstein's Monster, about ghosts and werewolves. I point thee to every book, every television show, every game that has ever attempted to portray the actions of psychopath or a sociopath. I direct thee unto the non-fiction DSM-IV as the proof, the final proof, that you need not experience to describe!
Through centuries writings were controlled, since a lot of people felt something was wrong but lacked the evidence. Now that there was a written word of it, that feeling became knowledge, and with knowledge becomes resolution. The masses became angry due to writings of early protestants in Germany; thousands of peasants died in rebellions that were ultimately in vain, while seeking only justice, fairness in treatment and just the being able to feed their families. But say a wrong word in a wrong place, you lose your head! Writing is a powerful tool, and simple words resonate within the people, but this requires sophistication. One can adore the beauty of simple expressions, laugh at the contrived adjectives and images, or feel anger towards the ugly rape of literature.
First, a question. You are describing something as rape. Therefore, you are saying that you have been raped, yes? Because if it is impossible to describe something without experiencing it?
Okay, so that was a low blow. The point remains.
I direct you to my commentary on dear old Dean above. I also direct you to your own logic. Those who could get published were, in the past, very limited. However, writing is not a discriminatory skill; your age, gender, sexual preference, and birthplace do not factor; hence a lot of people who may have been good writers in the past might not even have learned to read or write. Those who could submit for publishing now are a much broader spectrum of society. We are uncovering a larger number of the truly good today, because we are reaching a larger group of people. A number of those regarded as "truly great" back in the '70s and '80s were writing about the Chinese experience, something which had never been brought into western literature before. Similar things are happening now with Arabic and sub-Saharan African authors.
Or do you believe in some fashion that the underpinning experiences and analytical acumen for writing are factored for by being Western (or possibly Chinese and Arabic for certain periods, though I sort of doubt you've read that)?
Nevertheless, single words are the key here, but repeat one of them too much and all their meaning and power is lost! Constructing a book in a way that the writer can upset the reader in a well calculated manner in a single chapter is a start, but being able to do so continuously without thinking, just writing it, is a level that few ever achieve.
This utterly rejects the concept of escapist literature. Shakespeare no longer counts, I guess, nor Conan Doyle, nor even Homer. Le Morte D'Arthur? Forget it.
We can't all be out there doing the Upton Sinclair thing. It'd be incredibly boring for one thing. And Sinclair wasn't that great of a writer at holding your attention anyways. Mostly you kept reading because the book was already in front of you.
Only a few books can shatter the world of the reader so utterly that he becomes depressed, yet still being a great delight to read. Doing that does not need a plot construct that is based on shock value or detailed torture depictions, it is all about understanding of how human thinks and feels. Indeed one cannot help but wonder how do they do that. And just as easily they change the style and write a story that works exactly in an opposite way.
Crap, this is about Hemmingway isn't it? Or maybe Poe. Poe gets a lot of credit but if you truly want to freak the hell out I recommend James Patterson instead. He does it much better.
So you're saying that censorship is good. Shock value has a place, because there are things in reality that are shocking. There are things in fiction that are shocking too. Are you saying that the last mission of FS2 would be better without the supernova? Similarly, torture happens. If you're now prohibiting the depiction of things that actually occur in reality, and the depiction of things that do not exist, then what is left?
And honestly, this is my third rewrite of this because it got me angry. Since you are not writer I doubt you've even tried to understand how this affects one. (I have not yet reached the point where I doubt you can understand, since as I writer it is my creed that anything may be described accurately, given the correct words.) It's not just the shocking ignorance of what has and has not been written; the Chinese were writing what we'd class as "torture porn" back in the 1200s. It's that you're trying to limit me, to tell me that certain things are impossible. And what the hell is the pleasure of writing, if not to live vicariously things we will never actually experience?
Such texts cause the reader to wonder if the writer had lived through the times, and cannot escape the nagging feeling that everything in their texts is true and has likely happened.
The cyberpunk genre was about doing this, in minute detail, for something that had never actually happened. A lot of relatively recent SF is.
But the goal of writing something intentionally bad should never cross the mind of self-respecting writer, no matter how badly he feels his ego or rights have been violated. For in that particular instance they were lucky that the publisher did not accept the story and sell it as a learning device with great profit margins with a stamp of "written by the professionals" and ask for a sequel.
The trollfic lives. (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TrollFic) In a way, to intentionally write something poorly actually takes more skill than to write something good. It requires both the skillset to write well, and study of what it means to write poorly. You can acquire, or simply be born with, the ability write well. You have to actually study at that point to write wrong.
Also. "No True Scotsman." Look it up.
-
Good post, would read again.
-
I'm glad to see someone else calling out the "classics," because I've found that my enjoyment of them as a whole is severely limited. I still count A Separate Peace as one of the worst novels I've ever read, and you couldn't pay me enough to sit through anything by Joyce; I had to read a single short story of his once, and...ugh. As far as Hemingway goes, his writing style is nothing short of insufferable. :p
-
Having to experience everything in order to make any form of art would be a hindrance. The secret to writing about fictional experiences is, I believe, empathy. You don't need direct experience with death to cry in "Up!", you only need imagine what it's like to lose someone as close as his wife. Our imagination allows us to empathize with others' experiences.
Unfortunately, a good imagination isn't something you get by doing the same action over and over again. It requires new inputs to stir it around. Without actively examining events and people in the world, and critically thinking about them, imagination won't grow. However, that doesn't mean you actually need to experience something directly to get license to make art about it. Researching a topic will probably give you the same results, provided you can empathize with the subject. But empathizing and the imagination are like a muscle. The more you try to understand another person, the better you get at both of them.
It all seems tied together. The viewer and the artist both need to empathize with the subject in order for a piece of work to be considered exceptional. And being able to empathize requires imagination.
-
The brutal fact is that people looking to go into SF or fantasy publication are taught to expect 350-400 rejections before selling a single short story. Just one. That kind of rejection rate was not as commonplace back in the gee-whiz nuclear-rockets 40s and 50s.
This seems to be following a trend that extends into the professional world. 50 years ago going into science and engineering really was cool, but now it isn't and in many cases that generation is telling their kids not to go into it. It's no accident that the average age of an EE in North America is 46, the highest in the world.
-
- "Hello NGTM-1R, haven't seen you for a while around here!"
"Good to see you too Mika, what are you up to nowadays?"
- "Well, on top of writing stuff on Internet, I'm supposed to do some science too, but you know how my schedule is!"
"Come to think of it, I think I saw one of your articles. But I do have some questions for you about it, if you may? And by the way, where are you traveling to now?"
- "You did? I think my reputation is now forever lost on the eyes of my friends! But I'm heading to North, but have to wait outside since they haven't been able to melt the ice from the train - again."
"Mind to stop for a coffee and for a chat? It's cold out here!"
- "I'd be delighted to."
- "Ah, much better here inside! Oh yes please, I would like to have a cup of coffee."
"A cup of tea for me, please."
- "So what was it when you wrote about 'must having experience to write about something'? Isn't it clear that anyone can write about topics they want to? There's plenty of books that were written that way."
"Ah, now I know what article you are talking about. In fact, it didn't say you couldn't."
- "Explain yourself better, because that's a clear contradiction of what you wrote."
"It isn't. But in order to be able to do that well, that is where you start to see the difference."
- "You wrote about the capabilities of the old masters; their skill of putting feelings and thoughts to words. I think you neglect that a lot of people find old classics boring and uninteresting. Are you sure this isn't affected by the literature lessons, or your teacher?"
"I do find a lot of classics boring. Experience tells that they are probably the ones that the other people find interesting! But I can assure you there has been never any teacher or conditioning on liking the classics, the decision is purely mine alone. I have never taken a course in literature, nor did the linguistics teachers try to tell what books we should read - they were always more interested in word conjugation. I like what I like, there is no other way of putting it. I started reading when I was eight, the first memorable book that I can recall was MacLean's 'H.M.S. Ulysseus'. I can still imagine the salty water of North Atlantic ocean splashing to my face when German grenades fell next to the ship!"
- "What? I thought you wrote 'old masters' in there, didn't you? MacLean can hardly be called old, and you probably know how pretentious even older authors like Shakespeare are! Or how Arthur Conan Doyle consequentially became worse, if he ever was good to begin with."
"Funny that you mention that, but let me first answer your first question. I do find some generally accepted classics good, while digging up those not so well recognized have usually been better. They are still old from my perspective, though. Reading through the works of Shakespeare left me wondering about the reasons of his popularity, but years later I realized that he was a playwright, and not a novelist. I can't say I would have seen his plays yet, so I can't really say much about his style. Sherlock Holmes books were somewhat interesting on intellectual level, it was as if he never became a true human being in those books. You recall when I mentioned about experience? I think you could hold this as an example case. This is one of the things that breaks the current books for me."
- "So are you saying that 'old masters' wouldn't be those that are recognized as such?"
"Sorry for the interruption, but would you mind if I went to the restroom?"
- "By all means"
- "So where were we?"
"We were talking about your 'old masters' earlier."
- "Oh yes, one should not forget that art is a very personal thing. What one considers as way of putting words right is downright boring for someone else. And let me answer your next question, or at least the one that I think you'll ask next. But isn't that what it has been always like? I don't think so. I haven't found good books recently unless I started to dig up the old, so I guess they must non-existent because I haven't found them yet, so that's why! But I do have a theory of that though. But I'm afraid it is not yet fully formed."
"I think I'll ask you again about this next time we meet. The next question I have is about what you said about writing, about putting writer's own experience or himself in there. Doesn't many of the books or TV shows already disprove you that alien concepts cannot be written or displayed?"
- "As I said before, there is no stopping of describing them. It is another thing to make them believable or the human reactions reasonable when confronted with such things. I have never found horror that terrifying especially for this reason - the authors contrive themselves by making aliens as anti-human as possible. But mind can pick up negatives too, and notes the desperate trying. I can only recall one work where I think it was done close to right, and that was 'The Thing'. I haven't read 'Who goes there', so can't say much about that. Yet the creature's strategy felt somehow very human, and it was made very ugly to human."
"By the way, how does that Green Tea taste like?"
- "The usual, as if somebody poured in the results of yesterday's lawn mowing in the tea pot - just the way I like it!"
"Hey hey, just recalled you mentioned rape in your article, doesn't that imply by your own logic that you have experienced that?"
- "Close enough. But please do read carefully what was being said there too."
" --- But this is against all the unwritten rules in the literature, that all has to be described accurately!"
- "Sometimes when I feel like explaining something in the forum language doesn't work, I write as clearly and honestly as my heart feels, and mind desires, in literature language. Those who understand what it actually is about will hopefully be delighted, and those who don't, lose nothing. So yes I think so, some things are better left undescribed, or forgotten."
"Don't you think that is a little bit unfair?"
- "No."
"If you don't want to talk about it, then by all means. You don't like escape literature?"
- "I'm afraid you lost me there. Are you sure that I wrote that?"
"I'm sorry? Oh yes, we would like to pay."
- "I'll pay mine separately."
- "Mika, have you heard the reason of the cracking sound of the snow when you walk on it?"
"I think I should know the explanation but can't recall that for now. It's a shame really, since I really should be able to answer that question."
- "Could I ask you a straight question?"
"Sure"
- "Do you really think a lot of people didn't see through your writing for what it was?"
"You know, I'm not really sure if they did! It is the modern education and all, being able to do meticulous research, but I get the feeling people are more blind to reality as they ever were. I'm now wondering if I was like that after finishing high school or university! It is hard to describe it, but how well can you really notice? Being able to spot if a complete stranger such as the young kid there has problems with his upper back? Being able to see that young couple isn't actually kissing, they are really arguing and pretend to be calm just because they saw us coming? Have you ever been so connected to another person that you felt what he or she felt, right on the moment despite you were on the other side of the world? I occasionally meet people who can, and note that the sweeper there, bobbtmann says his badge, might be one. For some reason, I get the feeling he sees us for what we are. But let us speak of this some other time since I now need to get to Track 4 where my train leaves."
-"See you some other time then."
-
And yes, writing dialogue in a non-native tongue is a pain.
-
- "Hello NGTM-1R, haven't seen you for a while around here!"
"Good to see you too Mika, what are you up to nowadays?"
- "Well, on top of writing stuff on Internet, I'm supposed to do some science too, but you know how my schedule is!"
"Come to think of it, I think I saw one of your articles. But I do have some questions for you about it, if you may? And by the way, where are you traveling to now?"
- "You did? I think my reputation is now forever lost on the eyes of my friends! But I'm heading to North, but have to wait outside since they haven't been able to melt the ice from the train - again."
"Mind to stop for a coffee and for a chat? It's cold out here!"
- "I'd be delighted to."
A bad start. Already, the reader is confused about who is speaking what.
On top of that, strawmanning? Not a good tactic.
"So what was it when you wrote about 'must having experience to write about something'? Isn't it clear that anyone can write about topics they want to? There's plenty of books that were written that way."
"Ah, now I know what article you are talking about. In fact, it didn't say you couldn't."
- "Explain yourself better, because that's a clear contradiction of what you wrote."
"It isn't. But in order to be able to do that well, that is where you start to see the difference."
- "You wrote about the capabilities of the old masters; their skill of putting feelings and thoughts to words. I think you neglect that a lot of people find old classics boring and uninteresting. Are you sure this isn't affected by the literature lessons, or your teacher?"
"I do find a lot of classics boring. Experience tells that they are probably the ones that the other people find interesting! But I can assure you there has been never any teacher or conditioning on liking the classics, the decision is purely mine alone. I have never taken a course in literature, nor did the linguistics teachers try to tell what books we should read - they were always more interested in word conjugation. I like what I like, there is no other way of putting it. I started reading when I was eight, the first memorable book that I can recall was MacLean's 'H.M.S. Ulysseus'. I can still imagine the salty water of North Atlantic ocean splashing to my face when German grenades fell next to the ship!"
- "What? I thought you wrote 'old masters' in there, didn't you? MacLean can hardly be called old, and you probably know how pretentious even older authors like Shakespeare are! Or how Arthur Conan Doyle consequentially became worse, if he ever was good to begin with."
"Funny that you mention that, but let me first answer your first question. I do find some generally accepted classics good, while digging up those not so well recognized have usually been better. They are still old from my perspective, though. Reading through the works of Shakespeare left me wondering about the reasons of his popularity, but years later I realized that he was a playwright, and not a novelist. I can't say I would have seen his plays yet, so I can't really say much about his style. Sherlock Holmes books were somewhat interesting on intellectual level, it was as if he never became a true human being in those books. You recall when I mentioned about experience? I think you could hold this as an example case. This is one of the things that breaks the current books for me."
- "So are you saying that 'old masters' wouldn't be those that are recognized as such?"
"Sorry for the interruption, but would you mind if I went to the restroom?"
- "By all means"
All of that? Can be summarized as "I concede some of your points". Is that so damn hard to write?
- "So where were we?"
"We were talking about your 'old masters' earlier."
- "Oh yes, one should not forget that art is a very personal thing. What one considers as way of putting words right is downright boring for someone else. And let me answer your next question, or at least the one that I think you'll ask next. But isn't that what it has been always like? I don't think so. I haven't found good books recently unless I started to dig up the old, so I guess they must non-existent because I haven't found them yet, so that's why! But I do have a theory of that though. But I'm afraid it is not yet fully formed."
Oh here we go again with the bull****. "I haven't seen a good new book, so obviously there are none." Don't you see how incredibly stupid this argumentation is?
"I think I'll ask you again about this next time we meet. The next question I have is about what you said about writing, about putting writer's own experience or himself in there. Doesn't many of the books or TV shows already disprove you that alien concepts cannot be written or displayed?"
- "As I said before, there is no stopping of describing them. It is another thing to make them believable or the human reactions reasonable when confronted with such things. I have never found horror that terrifying especially for this reason - the authors contrive themselves by making aliens as anti-human as possible. But mind can pick up negatives too, and notes the desperate trying. I can only recall one work where I think it was done close to right, and that was 'The Thing'. I haven't read 'Who goes there', so can't say much about that. Yet the creature's strategy felt somehow very human, and it was made very ugly to human."
Less waffling, more explaining please. All you are saying is, "I haven't seen this specific example done right", which does nothing at all regarding your general line of argumentation, which is still "People should only write what they know, else the writing becomes unbelievable".
"Hey hey, just recalled you mentioned rape in your article, doesn't that imply by your own logic that you have experienced that?"
- "Close enough. But please do read carefully what was being said there too."
" --- But this is against all the unwritten rules in the literature, that all has to be described accurately!"
- "Sometimes when I feel like explaining something in the forum language doesn't work, I write as clearly and honestly as my heart feels, and mind desires, in literature language. Those who understand what it actually is about will hopefully be delighted, and those who don't, lose nothing. So yes I think so, some things are better left undescribed, or forgotten."
"Don't you think that is a little bit unfair?"
**** that. Explain yourself plainly, or don't post. Don't force us to read mountains of prose that needs to be interpreted to get at your points.
- "No."
"If you don't want to talk about it, then by all means. You don't like escape literature?"
- "I'm afraid you lost me there. Are you sure that I wrote that?"
"I'm sorry? Oh yes, we would like to pay."
- "I'll pay mine separately."
An interesting question, posed by yourself, and you dodge it? What the hell are you doing?
- "Do you really think a lot of people didn't see through your writing for what it was?"
"You know, I'm not really sure if they did! It is the modern education and all, being able to do meticulous research, but I get the feeling people are more blind to reality as they ever were.
Are you High Max? No, seriously, are you? Cos that's one of his "arguments".
I'm now wondering if I was like that after finishing high school or university! It is hard to describe it, but how well can you really notice? Being able to spot if a complete stranger such as the young kid there has problems with his upper back? Being able to see that young couple isn't actually kissing, they are really arguing and pretend to be calm just because they saw us coming? Have you ever been so connected to another person that you felt what he or she felt, right on the moment despite you were on the other side of the world? I occasionally meet people who can, and note that the sweeper there, bobbtmann says his badge, might be one. For some reason, I get the feeling he sees us for what we are. But let us speak of this some other time since I now need to get to Track 4 where my train leaves."
-"See you some other time then."
And there it ends on an opaque note that seems to indicate that bobbtman made some point you agree with.
What the hell.
-
Didactic Heinleinesque (or, heck, Jostein Gaarder-esque) dialogue without tags or islands. :blah: Not poorly written for a non-native speaker (and some non-native speakers are amongst the greatest craftsmen because they can look at the language from outside and really take it apart) but you don't put enough voice into the characters to make the lack of tags forgivable.
And your argument still boils down to your inability to distinguish the noise of the unfilitered now from the carefully distilled and packaged presentations that come down to you from the past. As far as I'm concerned your argument crashed and burned the moment you ignored the post about penny dreadfuls.
If you live in year N you would complain that the literature and media of year N-(25 to 500) was superior.
-
"Hey hey, just recalled you mentioned rape in your article, doesn't that imply by your own logic that you have experienced that?"
- "Close enough. But please do read carefully what was being said there too."
" --- But this is against all the unwritten rules in the literature, that all has to be described accurately!"
- "Sometimes when I feel like explaining something in the forum language doesn't work, I write as clearly and honestly as my heart feels, and mind desires, in literature language. Those who understand what it actually is about will hopefully be delighted, and those who don't, lose nothing. So yes I think so, some things are better left undescribed, or forgotten."
"Don't you think that is a little bit unfair?"
- "No."
Let me single this piece of bull**** out. Because it's the single wrongest statement you made in this piece.
What on earth are you thinking when saying that "some things should be left undescribed or forgotten"? Creating taboo zones around topics has never, and will never work. You may not like that people write about $TOPIC, you may in fact find it utterly horrifying and distasteful, but NOTHING gives you the right to even ask people to stop it.
-
Homer wrote about chopping up babies and throwing them into the ocean, I don't think he ever did it, any more than I suspect Shakespeare ever died of a wound that wasn't as wide as a barn door.
-
What on earth are you thinking when saying that "some things should be left undescribed or forgotten"? Creating taboo zones around topics has never, and will never work. You may not like that people write about $TOPIC, you may in fact find it utterly horrifying and distasteful, but NOTHING gives you the right to even ask people to stop it.
I don't think he was. I believe he's saying that he's not interested in, um, trying to communicate clearly on forums, or more charitably that he's not prepared to abandon his writing style. He thinks he's being as explicit as he can.
-
There are a few interpretations possible for that passage. I chose one.
If mika wanted to say something else, he should have been more clear.
-
Well, that's one way to illustrate the pitfalls of his chosen approach ;)
-
Words
You simply repeat the same tired assertions, without attempt to comprehend the arguments against you. I will, however, single out an incredible wrongness for further review.
However, loosely copying a Hemmingway short story in an effort to provoke me, that gets you no points at all.
"Hey hey, just recalled you mentioned rape in your article, doesn't that imply by your own logic that you have experienced that?"
- "Close enough. But please do read carefully what was being said there too."
" --- But this is against all the unwritten rules in the literature, that all has to be described accurately!"
- "Sometimes when I feel like explaining something in the forum language doesn't work, I write as clearly and honestly as my heart feels, and mind desires, in literature language. Those who understand what it actually is about will hopefully be delighted, and those who don't, lose nothing. So yes I think so, some things are better left undescribed, or forgotten."
"Don't you think that is a little bit unfair?"
- "No."
Like The E over there, I regard this as a higher plane of wrong. In fact, not only is this not correct, it's not even wrong.
I made no such statements about "unwritten rules of literature". I said that if you prohibit the accurate depiction of reality, you are now engaged in censorship. Literature's stance on censorship has been clear since the Ancient Greeks. They detest each other. The E has already explained the reasons better than I.
Furthermore, I did say that prohibiting the accurate depiction of reality, you are in effect robbing the author of the ability to evoke reality. And that's what you've been demanding until now! You must accurately evoke reality, by having experienced it! It doesn't appear to occur to you that people would write about horrific things to horrify.
Just because you already know that monsters exist doesn't mean I can simply point and say "he's a monster lol" and the audience will believe me. He has to be monstrous first. And if you want big monsters, they have to be really monstrous. Destroy-the-world melodrama is all well and good, but it's impersonal. Torture and rape are very personal. If you want me to believe someone is a dangerous sociopath, then they'd damn well better act like they're a dangerous sociopath on every level, not just the grand scheme of things.
-
However, loosely copying a Hemmingway short story in an effort to provoke me, that gets you no points at all.
Do not insult me.
I have read only one book of Hemingway during my life, and that's the "Old man and sea". Secondly, under no circumstances would the thought of copying somebody's work even come to my mind.
-
Okay, if you take a critique of your chosen mode of addressing the points raised here to be an insult to you, you should maybe consider not arguing on the Internet.
Also, address the points raised against your arguments, or be branded a troll.
-
Sigh,
You know, I still think writing this in prosaic form would have been far more nicer (and funnier for me), but perhaps we all learn something. At least I could have upheld my standards and figured how to use some other writing style than this bland scientific-related one. I do write enough there.
First point about my personality: I'm not High Max, but since you, The E, are not going to believe me in any case, please ask terranemperor. He has seen me in real life. Though for you that only proves that I exist, but it doesn't prove that I'm not him, now does it?
Second: I tried to make the dialogue readable. Adding name tags to it makes it look like a play (I tested it), and that I didn't want. I can't change the background colors of each talker in this forum, and I can't write English dialects - that would have been the way I would have done it in my native tongue.
You all raised the censorship in literature as the worst wrong that could be. Personally, I think that's just garbage and you haven't thought through it. There will always be stuff you don't write down there because of the norms of the society, whether this is called self-censorship or censorship, it doesn't matter to me. It is censorship nevertheless. Let me list a couple of examples, since you are not going to think about this otherwise. Example 1. Write a love scene realistically. I know there is sex industry for that, but that's besides the point: you don't really find them in normal books, do you? Now why is that? Is it because publisher didn't want it there, or because writer himself didn't want to write it there? Considered it tasteless or what? I say censorship. Example 2. Sit down in the corner of the street and write down all your thoughts, honestly. I think sooner or later you are likely going to end up with something you are not going to write down. Why is that? Isn't that censorship or no? Example 3. There is a war book that was published in 1950s, that had lots of relevant critique towards leading the war. It also contained portions that actively portrayed all women serving in the front lines as whores. The parts about women were censored out. Was that for better or the worse? Example 4. Worst of all, the Germany example earlier that I wrote down there for you to see, but yet everybody is as if it didn't exist there! Simplified version: incitement of several writers caused peasant riots that killed thousands of them. Good or bad? There are other examples of this in several other countries, likewise in mine. Example 5. Try to talk or write anything of WWII time with Germans. Go on, just try it. Yes, what you'll note is a form of self-censorship. Though this I find ridiculous myself, but the point is, that really happens now. Perhaps they are not yet ready to go through it fully, but as it is said, time will heal.
So holding on to ideals is all well and good - as a side note, it sounds very American to me ("I want my freedoms!") - but can you really carry the responsibility it takes? Seriously? How do you define when you can blame the writer or the artist for the damage he has caused with his art? I'm willing to bet you leave that for legislation, which means some of the stuff will not be accepted. But you were against censorship, weren't you? So, I think there will always be censorship in any case, whether it is self-imposed or not, but you are just lying to yourselves about it. Yes, I say that sometimes the censorship has made stuff better. For The E's sake here I still need to emphasize that it isn't always for the better either, since I think if I don't explicitly say that, he really doesn't - there was a specific verb for it, grok? - it from the context.
Is this clear enough for ya?
For the impatient people, the three following parts will happen either tomorrow or in the end of next week since I'll be in Germany and will not be connected to the internet.
- Replies to the argument points, and introduction of predictions on where next books that I consider good are written and why.
- Ten penny novels - this one absolutely requires a prosaic form. You gave me an idea that I simply have to put in there in specific style.
- Internet language and text perception as a function of viewer's age and location
-
Sigh,
You know, I still think writing this in prosaic form would have been far more nicer (and funnier for me), but perhaps we all learn something. At least I could have upheld my standards and figured how to use some other writing style than this bland scientific-related one. I do write enough there.
First point about my personality: I'm not High Max, but since you, The E, are not going to believe me in any case, please ask terranemperor. He has seen me in real life. Though for you that only proves that I exist, but it doesn't prove that I'm not him, now does it?
I don't actually care. Still, using the same arguments as a noted moron and troll doesn't give you points. At all. Especially not when those arguments are complete bull****.
Second: I tried to make the dialogue readable.
Was it readable? Yes
Was it a good idea to use that form, in this case? No. Because you traded clearness of expression for artistic stuff that only made you look pretentious.
Adding name tags to it makes it look like a play (I tested it), and that I didn't want. I can't change the background colors of each talker in this forum,
Yes you can, see? and I can't write English dialects - that would have been the way I would have done it in my native tongue.
You all raised the censorship in literature as the worst wrong that could be. Personally, I think that's just garbage and you haven't thought through it.
But we did. We thought long, and hard, and concluded that freedom of speech is a good too important to be compromised for any reason.
There will always be stuff you don't write down there because of the norms of the society, whether this is called self-censorship or censorship, it doesn't matter to me. It is censorship nevertheless.
There's a difference between a writer not writing about a subject, and a writer being forbidden to write about a subject. If you can't see it, you're pretty much a lost cause.
Let me list a couple of examples, since you are not going to think about this otherwise. Example 1. Write a love scene realistically. I know there is sex industry for that, but that's besides the point: you don't really find them in normal books, do you? Now why is that? Is it because publisher didn't want it there, or because writer himself didn't want to write it there? Considered it tasteless or what? I say censorship.
That would be self-censorship. Also, as someone (don't remember who) said, "Sex is only interesting if you're doing it". Writing good love scenes without falling into IKEA Erotica is hard, and most writers may choose not to go there out of a desire not to disappoint their audiences.
Example 2. Sit down in the corner of the street and write down all your thoughts, honestly. I think sooner or later you are likely going to end up with something you are not going to write down. Why is that? Isn't that censorship or no?
Self-censorship again. Also, immaterial. A writer choosing not to write about a given subject is exercising his right of free speech, and there's nothing wrong with that.
Example 3. There is a war book that was published in 1950s, that had lots of relevant critique towards leading the war. It also contained portions that actively portrayed all women serving in the front lines as whores. The parts about women were censored out. Was that for better or the worse?
That sounds like external censorship. Which is bad. Please read up on some history. Get this through your head. NO form of external censorship should ever be acceptable.
Example 4. Worst of all, the Germany example earlier that I wrote down there for you to see, but yet everybody is as if it didn't exist there! Simplified version: incitement of several writers caused peasant riots that killed thousands of them. Good or bad? There are other examples of this in several other countries, likewise in mine.
Please repeat your statement, with more links. Because, as a german, I am quite unaware of this happening.
Also? Not a good argument for censorship. Not. At. ALL. There is NEVER only one reason for something like this, and while there may be a single flashpoint that ignites the tension, it usually is not the cause.
Example 5. Try to talk or write anything of WWII time with Germans. Go on, just try it. Yes, what you'll note is a form of self-censorship. Though this I find ridiculous myself, but the point is, that really happens now. Perhaps they are not yet ready to go through it fully, but as it is said, time will heal.
Please cite more specific examples. WW2 isn't the same kind of "don't touch" topic it was in Germany, soooo.....
So holding on to ideals is all well and good - as a side note, it sounds very American to me ("I want my freedoms!") - but can you really carry the responsibility it takes? Seriously? How do you define when you can blame the writer or the artist for the damage he has caused with his art?
Show examples where a single work of art was directly, and solely, responsible for "damage".
I'm willing to bet you leave that for legislation, which means some of the stuff will not be accepted. But you were against censorship, weren't you?
You are trying to drag me into a trap here.
Not falling for it. Censorship, if it is motivated by an external source, and especially if it is enforced by law, is undesirable, and not actually working. Again, IF you can prove that a given artists' work is directly responsible for some damaging act, you can drag the artist into a court of law.
Good luck with that though.
So, I think there will always be censorship in any case, whether it is self-imposed or not, but you are just lying to yourselves about it. Yes, I say that sometimes the censorship has made stuff better. For The E's sake here I still need to emphasize that it isn't always for the better either, since I think if I don't explicitly say that, he really doesn't - there was a specific verb for it, grok? - it from the context.
If you can't see the difference between self-censorship and external censorship and why the latter is evil and the former a normal part of the writing process, you should leave this thread. You apparently don't understand writing, but we've established THAT already.
Is this clear enough for ya?
Yeah. Of course, it's still bull****, but whatever.
-
Second: I tried to make the dialogue readable. Adding name tags to it makes it look like a play (I tested it), and that I didn't want. I can't change the background colors of each talker in this forum, and I can't write English dialects - that would have been the way I would have done it in my native tongue.
That is not what a dialogue tag is.
This conversation is so dumb.
-
This topic has moved quite far from gaming today, has it not?
-
Off topicness is somewhat a habit for here, but it's moving dangerously close to attacking the commenter rather than the comments.
The conversation isn't without merits, but I think everyone involved could do with taking a step back. I'm not going to lock it, but I am going to request that people calm down.
-
There will always be stuff you don't write down there because of the norms of the society, whether this is called self-censorship or censorship, it doesn't matter to me.
There is only one acceptable reason for a writer to not follow the threads of plot and character wherever they lead. That is because they can't. There are internal can'ts. I've run against them a few times myself. I can't reliably describe the thoughts of some characters I deal with. I have never written a rape because I, the author, am unable to justify the act to the point that I do not think I can create a convincing justification for the character. These are my personal failings. I don't necessarily seek to overcome all of them, since I regard some of them as evidence of my continued sanity, but they're still an internal problem.
You, however, seem to think that a writer is going to take well to an external can't. And I will tell you that this has never and will never happen. We despise them. We work hard to subvert them. We push the limits as much as we can. We sneak crap under the radar, we paint flaming skulls on the sides of it and go at the radar station guns blazing screaming cursewords if you'll let us. We don't like being limited, and we will tear it down if we can.
It is the nature of the writer. Those of us who would be remembered, or just liked, we will side with the underdog somehow. Like Twain, our sympathies will instinctively fall upon the oppressed, not the oppressors. This is what we do.
It is censorship nevertheless. Let me list a couple of examples, since you are not going to think about this otherwise. Example 1. Write a love scene realistically. I know there is sex industry for that, but that's besides the point: you don't really find them in normal books, do you? Now why is that? Is it because publisher didn't want it there, or because writer himself didn't want to write it there? Considered it tasteless or what? I say censorship.
You haven't actually read a fantasy novel in the last ten years, have you? It's practically mandatory to have a sex scene in there these days. Urban fantasy's troubles being taken seriously as a genre can usually be traced to this source too.
Sex is something we humans do. And we like it. So when we write about semi-idealized or at least very interesting people and omit sex or sexual themes, that's sort of like writing about the sky for a whole book and claiming it's colored green.
Hell, Asimov dropped a sex scene a few times. Shakespeare was notorious for his double entendres.
Example 2. Sit down in the corner of the street and write down all your thoughts, honestly. I think sooner or later you are likely going to end up with something you are not going to write down. Why is that? Isn't that censorship or no?
...no, I can't say I would have that problem.
If you can't understand the difference between choice and non-choice, I think that we're never going to settle this argument because it's clear that your thought processes bear no resemblance to mine, and likely not to The E's as well.
I also think that if you can't understand the difference between choice and non-choice you might actually be an AI attempting to pass the...no I take that back. Basically, I know that you actually do understand the concept of and meaning of choice. You have to. You are human. I can only conclude that your ignorance of the importance of choice is willful.
Example 3. There is a war book that was published in 1950s, that had lots of relevant critique towards leading the war. It also contained portions that actively portrayed all women serving in the front lines as whores. The parts about women were censored out. Was that for better or the worse?
Censorship is always bad. There are, of course, graduations of badness. If the portrayal did nothing to advance the book's points, plot, or nature, then it was still bad but not as bad as it could have been. If it was a nonfiction book that was describing reality, than it depends on how well it was accurately describing reality before and after censorship, but it's still bad. For one thing, now nobody knows the author is a raging jackass.
Example 4. Worst of all, the Germany example earlier that I wrote down there for you to see, but yet everybody is as if it didn't exist there! Simplified version: incitement of several writers caused peasant riots that killed thousands of them. Good or bad? There are other examples of this in several other countries, likewise in mine.
Yeah, it was buried under a mound of useless commentary that made no sense. Germany examining its own actions in WW2 has done much to improve that country arguably. Similarly, Japan not examining its own actions in WW2 has arguably done much to damage that country. It's certainly caused big problems in foreign relations.
Your example, however, is nonsensical. People don't riot without an underlying cause. If someone wrote a book that caused riots, then the book can only be regarded as a catalyst, not a root cause, and likely merely exposed a condition already existing.
Example 5. Try to talk or write anything of WWII time with Germans. Go on, just try it.
Back in the days when Steel Panthers 3 could still be PBEM'd reliably, my favorite guy to play with was German. We debated the finer points of tank design in WW2 endlessly and were both great fans of the Tiger. He also played Waffen SS and owned to the political incorrectness of it all. (It in fact amused him endlessly that people would notice his German email addy and be surprised he'd play an SS Scherwes Panzerabieltung.)
So holding on to ideals is all well and good - as a side note, it sounds very American to me ("I want my freedoms!") - but can you really carry the responsibility it takes? Seriously?
What responsibility? We were, until this post, discussing the writing of fiction. I just write a damn story. Whatever anyone else makes of it is their problem.
How do you define when you can blame the writer or the artist for the damage he has caused with his art?
There's no polite way to put this, so I'm not even going to try. I apologize in advance to Flipside, and anyone else this might offend save Mika (who I hope it offends, because if he gets offended it might make him think about why he's offended), for this outburst.
Did you seriously just say what I think you said? That a writer or artist is to blame for how other people react? I'm sorry, but that's stupid. I can try to provoke a reaction, but ultimately what other people do is done by other people and holding me responsible for their actions is completely whitie-tighties-on-your-head idiocy.
I'm willing to bet you leave that for legislation, which means some of the stuff will not be accepted.
No, I think the question doesn't even exist. The scenario you posit is utterly without rational or logical sense in any way, shape, or form.
But you were against censorship, weren't you?
Still am. Without contradiction.
So, I think there will always be censorship in any case, whether it is self-imposed or not, but you are just lying to yourselves about it. Yes, I say that sometimes the censorship has made stuff better.
Cite examples. No, seriously. I want you to cite one real-world example where censorship improved a story. I'm 99.999999999% sure you can't do it.
Is this clear enough for ya?
Absolutely. All is now made clear. Unfortunately, not in a good way.
-
I think that the difference of opinion here is based on different definitions of the term censorship. Mika seems to be taking a broad, all-encompassing approach to the term. By that I mean anytime a thought is not expressed, or never even occurs, based on some external source. It doesn't even have to be some direct gag order from another person or agency.
Our work can be censored without us knowing, or even thinking it's wrong. As we grow up we develop around our society's customs, traditions, and whatever. These ways of living have a way of detemining what are thoughts are going to be. How strongly we associate with these customs will determine how willing we are challenge those thoughts.
I know that NGTM-1R believes that writers (and I assume by extension, all artists) naturally resist censorship, and try to subvert it wherever they can. As a graffiti artist myself, I can sympathize with that. But consider this: artist censor-resistors form social groups of their own. These social groups come with their own limitations and restrictions on behaviour and art-content. And the artists who belong to these groups are so busy subverting the established authorities that they fail to see their self imposed censorship. It's sneaky, and it can get in the way of really free thought.
Despite all that, I'm still in favour of some censorship in art, both self imposed and from exterior sources. I artists actually are interested in convincing people to think new thoughts, then they can't just whack them over the head with something so outrageously different that they fail to grasp the significance of a piece of art. Artists have to take out parts that might get in the way of their message, for the sake of legibility with the intended audience. It's also a matter of personal integrity.
For instance, let's say an artist honestly cared about dogs in Costa Rica, and wanted to draw attention to their plight. Tying a dog up and starving it to death in a gallery seems to sacrifice the noble cause for the sake of publicity. It also might cause the audience to question the validity of the artist's statement and his practice, drawing attention away from the dogs. Even if the dog does not in fact die, the message is lost in the discussion about the validity of art. In this case some foresight and self-censorship could have saved the message.
-
You fall in the same cognitive trap as mika.
Self-censorship is one thing.
External censorship is quite another.
Self-censorship is part of the creative process, in some ways.
External censorship comes in after the creative process is finished, to alter the finished product to make it more "acceptable" to the censors. It is an intrusive process, and this intrusion directly violates the artists' freedom of expression. In a democracy, all forms of expression should be allowed, and in fact, must be allowed.
Your example there is an example of self-censorship, where the artist is crafting his message to have the intended effect on the audience.
Now find an example where external censorship is beneficial.
-
Heh, the moment Mika suggested that you don't find sex scenes in normal books I could tell he doesn't read much.
-
There's a reason why I don't even use the term "self-censorship" to describe an author's or artist's choice to not bring certain elements into play, and this thread is aptly demonstrating it.
-
This is amazingly off-topic, as always.
Also, I've always felt that an author has his personal limits. It's fairly common for authors to use story elements, symbols, motifs, and other ideas that have been derived from their own thoughts and beliefs. But one would not expect many applicable authors to, say, include veiled personal psychotic urges or sexual fetishes in their works, though there are some interesting exceptions, though usually when such a thing happens, the entire book is about that topic.
I wouldn't call it "self-censorship." We aren't living in the 18th century; if an author wants to include a sex scene to advance the plot or provide character development or some other form of storytelling, he/she is not going to hold back on the principle of kosher family values or something. Hell, I've seen books targeted for 12-year-olds including crazy **** like torture and attempted rape.
As for other alleged "self-censorship" cases, an author is not going to hold himself back to please greater society; he/she will go forward with his/her true thoughts, likely gathering the attention of many after some people might view the offending work as... offensive, and then write all about how much they think the work is full of depravity, giving the author all sorts of recognition.
-
...Your example there is an example of self-censorship, where the artist is crafting his message to have the intended effect on the audience.
Now find an example where external censorship is beneficial.
Sure. In Canada, we have laws against hate speech. In effect, these laws act as a form of censorship, protecting people (usually minority groups) from bigotry's more insidious manifestations, like lynching.
Now it's my turn to explain why you, The E, have fallen into a trap of your own. You need to free your mind. Censorship can't be divided cleanly into external and internal. A lot of censoring any artist does is internal, but they do it without realizing it. It's like stopping at a red light in a car. It just seems natural, and anything else is unconscionable.
These seemingly self-evident things are not natural, though.They come from exterior sources like the culture you're brought up in. So when artists talk about how they're free thinkers and they're free to express their thoughts, they're only partially right. The human mind makes fortresses around certain concepts that make people unable challenge them. So freedom of artistic expression is only free if the artist is able to resist his own upbringing. And from my experience in the art world, this does not happen much. Case study, look at homophobia or racisme. There are no good reasons for either of these things, yet they are prevalent in society.
So in a way, artists are always censored from exteriour sources, and the artist is the enforcer.
On another note, I played Battlezone the other night. It's not as good as I remember.
-
Sure. In Canada, we have laws against hate speech. In effect, these laws act as a form of censorship, protecting people (usually minority groups) from bigotry's more insidious manifestations, like lynching.
Please provide evidence. Please provide concrete evidence that barring this "hate speech" from public discourse has prevented violence (Yes, that's asking to prove a negative.).
Now it's my turn to explain why you, The E, have fallen into a trap of your own. You need to free your mind. Censorship can't be divided cleanly into external and internal.
Oh yes it can.
A lot of censoring any artist does is internal, but they do it without realizing it. It's like stopping at a red light in a car. It just seems natural, and anything else is unconscionable.
That, as pointed out earlier, is the normal creative process.
These seemingly self-evident things are not natural, though.They come from exterior sources like the culture you're brought up in. So when artists talk about how they're free thinkers and they're free to express their thoughts, they're only partially right. The human mind makes fortresses around certain concepts that make people unable challenge them. So freedom of artistic expression is only free if the artist is able to resist his own upbringing. And from my experience in the art world, this does not happen much. Case study, look at homophobia or racisme. There are no good reasons for either of these things, yet they are prevalent in society.
Your point being? I mean, I get what you are saying about artists being influenced and shaped by their environment, noone's going to dispute that, but what does this have to do with censorship? So far, we're still at the part where the artist goes through an internal process on his own.
So in a way, artists are always censored from exteriour sources, and the artist is the enforcer.
Yeah, no.
Let me introduce you to the Comics Code Authority (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comics_Code_Authority). That is external censorship. Sure, they started out well-meaning, but the net effect? It killed artistic expression in american comic books for several decades, as stories that dealt with darker aspects of humanity could only be touched upon lightly, and some aspects (like sexuality) had to be circumvented entirely.
In a similar vein, there existed the Hays Code (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hays_Code), which imposed similarly ridiculous rules on the film industry. Which was abandoned as soon as it turned out that it interfered with the Studio's ability to make money (Because films coming out of europe that were not bound to this bull**** were being lots more successful).
And those things? Those were harmless against the utter insanity that is the movie rating system in america today.
Now, let's talk about Germany for a bit. As you may or may not know, displaying a Swastika, or any symbol associated with the Nazis in a political context is illegal. Same goes for the usual litany of hate speech, public slander, and other stuff.
Did that prevent the formation of large fascist movements? No.
What it did do instead is force those idiots to hide their messages better, making them more dangerous in the process. I can not see how that is a good thing.
In the end, as NGTM-1R pointed out, "self-censorship" is meaningless, as it's a part of the creative process.
External censorship, whether it's from the state, from a publisher, from anyone who is not part of the artists' creative process, is a bad thing. Forcing someone to compromise their visions in the service of some external goal is a bad thing.
Forcibly altering someone else's visions through after-the-fact manipulation is a crime.
-
At separate times I've mentioned the curtailing of a thought on the artist's part. The first instance was when an artist consciously decides to not express something. The second instance, which was the one in my last post, is done unconsciously on the part of the artist. this is NOT part of the creative process, as far as the common interpretation goes. This is where the upbringing of the artist interferes with the creation of thought. Maybe I should rephrase that as "self-induced censorship".
As for proving anything I guess I'm on the same grounds as you. All I have is anecdotal evidence, and I'm sure you know that's the worst kind of evidence. You presume that anti-hate laws didn't stop fascism movements from springing up, just as I presume that without the laws it would be much worse. Is it because the Hays Code was overturned that Hollywood now produces such intellectual gems these days?
Yeah, no.
When have been rude to you? Belittling me doesn't prove you right.
-
The second instance, which was the one in my last post, is done unconsciously on the part of the artist. this is NOT part of the creative process, as far as the common interpretation goes. This is where the upbringing of the artist interferes with the creation of thought. Maybe I should rephrase that as "self-induced censorship".
The creative process is what gets you words on a page from a writer. Claiming that the author's unconscious prejudices do not factor into what he writes on the page is lunacy. Indeed, there is art (Jackson Pollack) that exists solely as the physical expression of unconscious choices. Your argument is nonsense.
There's also a saying you would do well to learn. "A poor writer reveals more of himself than his characters." You want to learn what somebody thinks on a certain subject? See how it's treated in their first story. That's purely an unconscious act for the most part. The craft of writing is frequently about dragging your unconscious prejudices out into the light and stabbing them to death with your pen so that your characters do not become expressions of yourself and your views. Even "self-censorship" is a sign of a poor artist or writer. When I make a choice to not include something, it's not because I don't like it; it's because I think I'll **** up things horribly in so doing.
You presume that anti-hate laws didn't stop fascism movements from springing up,
Uh, no, he doesn't presume anything. He knows it didn't. He's speaking of movements that already exist. This is empirical fact, not presumption. The existence of neo-Nazi groups in Germany and especially the former DDR is a matter of record.
-
You haven't actually read a fantasy novel in the last ten years, have you? It's practically mandatory to have a sex scene in there these days. Urban fantasy's troubles being taken seriously as a genre can usually be traced to this source too.
Sex is something we humans do. And we like it. So when we write about semi-idealized or at least very interesting people and omit sex or sexual themes, that's sort of like writing about the sky for a whole book and claiming it's colored green.
Bollocks. This obsession with sex can bug me sometimes.
You realise there can very ell be relationships that don't end with hot, steamy sex...or that aren't really sex-based at all?
Trying to force a sex scene everywhere is just as bad - if not worse - than censoring every such scene.
-
Before the inevitable refutation of TrashMan's point comes, I feel like there is something to it. I've read a few modern-ish novels (I sorely pity anyone else who had to sit through the hell that is All the Pretty Horses) that seemed to throw in a gratuitous sex scene or two just to meet some sort of arbitrary external quota. They didn't serve as some sort of integral part of a character's motivations, or as a commentary on society, or anything along those lines. They're just...there. And they usually have the effect of yanking me right out of my immersion in the story, because it's plain that they're essentially just thinly-veiled textual porn. There's a reason that Family Guy's Stewie made a crack about "menopausal masturbatory aids"...pretty much any beach read you pick up has at least one instance in it.
I mean, yes, sexuality is a substantial part of the human experience, and it's certainly able to be used to great effect in the hands of a competent writer. But let's not pretend that it can't just as easily thrown into a scene just for the sake of doing so.
-
But I don't think that's any different from the treatment of violence. And it can be done well.
The sex scenes in Altered Carbon were really graphic, and if you find that wince-inducing you would wince. But they were also utterly vital to the characters and plot.
And it says something odd that we're more alarmed by consenting sex between two adults than nonconsensual skull penetration via bullet between two adults. I dunno.
-
When have been rude to you? Belittling me doesn't prove you right.
It is not only you that The E belittles. He's quite simply a self-obsessed person who treats everyone as inferior, with possibly a few exceptions that helped him raise the ranks through yelling at noobs and playing the infallible demigod. The power of the Mighty Blue Badge. however, permits him to troll around undeterred.
-
That's enough. I asked politely once and it didn't even last a page.
If people have a problem with The E's moderation technique then please take it up with himself or an Admin via the PM system, this is not a good way to approach concerns, and please bear in mind that The E, like all of us, did not stop being a member of this Forum simply because they got a Moderator badge and is as entitled as anyone else to state his opinion. The manner that opinion is stated is seperate from the role of the person, he was not moderating, he was commenting, please treat it as such.
Locked.
-
When have been rude to you? Belittling me doesn't prove you right.
It is not only you that The E belittles. He's quite simply a self-obsessed person who treats everyone as inferior, with possibly a few exceptions that helped him raise the ranks through yelling at noobs and playing the infallible demigod. The power of the Mighty Blue Badge. however, permits him to troll around undeterred.
But the moderator badge is red. I hope that wasn't a jab at BP.
Also I promise that for all the The_E's volcanic exterior he is very reasonable. I doubt he has a problem with you and if you have an issue you can probably talk it out in short order.
-
When have been rude to you? Belittling me doesn't prove you right.
It is not only you that The E belittles. He's quite simply a self-obsessed person who treats everyone as inferior,
This is arguably true. I tend to belittle people all the time. Catch is, I am also mostly right in what I say.
with possibly a few exceptions that helped him raise the ranks through yelling at noobs and playing the infallible demigod. The power of the Mighty Blue Badge. however, permits him to troll around undeterred.
First of all, if I am posting on a thread like this, I am acting as a normal board member first. You, and anyone else, are free to rip me or my posts apart as much as you feel necessary. I promise I won't take it personal. Much. If you really think I crossed a line, that's what the report function is for.