Barnestorming #5872- Fun-First Design, Hot

Pinball FX 2, I kinda like the World War Hulk table. Of course I only played each one briefly.

Cyberpunk is back in vogue? Did I miss the memo?

So far I have just played hulk and Fear Itself. I think Fear Itself has a lot of table to uncover....it is quite difficult to beat some of the Worthy. I only beat 2 out of 6 so far. Hulk is good; I will have to try out the other two later.

What's the game in the cover picture?

I really hoped the Thor movie would have been more like those old 80's written ones but it wasn't and i was slightly sad. I can remember being one of the few people that passed on x-men and stuff in those days to read Thor. Glad to see there are others that really enjoyed some superb writing and an art style that was very good.

I just picked up Le Havre on IOS last night and it's really good with a superb tutorial. I'm not a big fan of Agricola but i have always enjoyed Le Havre for some reason.

When i saw the trailer for John Carter at the theatres the first thing that popped into my head was the movie 10,000 BC. That pretty much firmly planted it in the Redbox rental category maybe.

You totally did, Chapel. The new Deus Ex and Syndicate video games, Infiltration and the Netrunner relaunch. Lots of cyberpunk stuff going on. Also this decent editorial in Wired about how Cyberpunk saved science fiction.

http://www.wired.com/underwire/2012/06/pl_cyberpunk/

I liked John Carter, but I was going to. One of my favorite characters of all time finally got a flick. Was it great? No. Was it better than OK? Yeah, it was better than OK. But not by a lot. I agree, though, that "John Carter: Warlord of Mars" would've flown better. Or "Dejah Thoris' Vagina Flapping About" might attract more interest. "John Carter". What the fuck? How much more nondescript can you get?

I liked Iron Man. I liked Iron Man 2. I liked Thor. Captain America, not so much. Kinda weenie. Really, I liked the acting in Iron Man the best, but the story of Thor the most.

And we all now know that Gameshark sucks fat dog cawk, and NoHighScores.com is the no-longer new home. What I also know is that your academic writing bullshit has drained your brain cells a little because you didn't make that a link, forcing me to actually type in the URL. Wanker.

Lot of stuff this week...let's start with the easy things:

1) Simonson's Thor is indeed awesome, probably the best early 80s non-Moore comic from the Big Two. On Comixology, are the colors the original 80s colors or the new recolored version? I know that people have pretty varied feelings, in fact I think the new colors are mostly pretty liked, but I feel like that edgy 80s modern quality of Simonson's drawing is severely hampered by the new colors, which are more "realistic" and add in lots of shading so that it's literally not as "edgy". The angular drawing really begs for those bold flat colors.

2) Warren Ellis blows. The only comics of his I like are his Authority run, and that's in large part due to the art and because it's not ashamed to be pretty juvenile, unlike so much of his stuff which is juvenile attempts at tackling "important" topics. Planetary had awesome art, too, but stunk outside of a couple issues. Kind of unbelievable that this guy was writing manifestos about improving the quality of comics in the late 90s.

3) Didn't see the John Carter movie and probably won't, though I'm tempted to because my Dad read me a significant chunk of the Carter books every night before bed when I was a kid. He was involved in I think three of the previous aborted attempts at John Carter movies, and was tremendously hurt that he wasn't asked to do anything for this one and that the big chance at a John Carter movie was blown by such a piece of crap. I hear that the Civil War backstory that's so essential to the character was eliminated for this new one? There were plans for an animated version by Bob Clampett at some point, that could've been cool! But sometimes these things work better in the imagination as "could-have-beens", and are really "couldn't-have-ever-beens" (see: Moebius & Jodorowsky Dune w/ Salvador Dali and Orson Welles).

4) About the Cracked LCD article: shit, that's a big topic, too big for me to want to write a response at the moment. I loved the article merely for bringing up the thorny topic and for finally not being a review, but I'm disappointed that there are basically no suggestions for how to tackle the problem beyond "judge a game by its own standards", and I'm disappointed by the suggestion that we don't want to apply critical rigor to "fun-first" games, there's got to be a way to talk about what makes Talisman, Chaostle, and Magical Athelete more fun than a million other attempts at "dumb fun" games that are excruciating.

Anyone who hasn't listened to Richard Garfield's recent podcast about making the King of Tokyo expansion really should, and I say this as a podcast-hater and as someone who hasn't played KoT yet. He talks very technically about the factors that make the game fun, and all the ways that tweaking it slightly can completely ruin the fun. It's exactly what I'm looking for right now, a technical and intellectual discussion about a very "fun-first" game. Link:
http://www.threedonkeys.com/blog/archives/722

Also looking forward to this book Garfield is involved with:
http://www.amazon.com/Characteristics-Games-George-Skaff-Elias/dp/026201713X

I've been wondering this as well. Why is DungeonQuest fun, and Munchkin painful? At some point it becomes unsatisfying to basically say "beats me," but I don't know a better answer.

Though I haven't read it yet (NHS blocked at work, yo), I'll agree that it's nice to see a non-review. Particularly because I now see how tough it can be to actually write a non-review. Way harder for me.

OK Dragonstout, this is your article buddy so you first:

1) I believe it's the original coloring but I'm not sure. It's very crisp-looking, I'm not seeing any "postproduction" shading or anything. They have both the issues and the Thor Visionaries collections but it seems that they just scanned the issues. I just got through "The Last Viking", which was FUCKING GREAT. I love these books, I hate that I was too busy reading GI Joe, Transformers, and X-Men at the time to pick these up.

2) Yeah, I think Ellis is hugely overrated. Authority was good, but it was really Mark Millar that made it great. Trasnmetropolitan is a little too precious for its own good, and I never really got into the story or Spider as a character. Some cool futurist concepts, and a lot of twaddle. Planetary is fun, at least for the first few issues, because of the references to other nerd stuff. I absolutely HATE the characters. The Drummer...really?

3) Yeah, the Civil War thing is out...it still has an antebellum setting, but Carter is sort of a brigand. And it doesn't have that vauge business where he just sort of dozes off in the cave or whatever. Other stuff happens. BTW...who is your dad, if you don't mind sharing?

Jodorowsky Dune...ergh...if only. Salavdor Dali as the Padishah Emperor, sitting on a toilet shaped like dolphins that cup your genitals and buttocks. Dali wanted something like $10,000 an hour to be on set.

4) Oh no, I very spscifically stated in the article that we _shouldn't_ shy away from serious analysis and critical rigor in discussing "fun first" designs. Just like how Beatles songs deserve the veneration of reasoned criticism, so too does Talisman. I've got some more to write on this subject that sort of explains why I think there isn't a firm answer to how we can define the difference between Magical Athelete and, say, Munchkin...but it's sort of an inconvenient truth about games writing and the possibility of games criticism.

Pete, I've heard that it was actually Andrew Stanton that dissuaded having anything to do with Mars or science fiction in the title of the film, and he actually refused marketing materials and collateral that played up the science fiction elements. Look at even the DVD case- that stark, impact font. Not something very sci-fi at all. I think he was very arrogant in making this film, and part of that was that I think he felt like it would be taken more seriously if it had a title like "Erin Brokovich" or "Michael Clayton". There's also this thing where Disney flopped a film called "Mars Needs Moms" and _they_ didn't want Mars in the title.

But your comments pretty much validate why I think this movie wasn't completely trashed by more genre-oriented folks...you _wanted_ this movie to be great, and because it was at least mediocre I think it turns out to be "good enough".

Chapel- yeah, Cyberpunk is definitely back. CD Projekt Red (The Witcher) is even making a 2020-based game.

The game in the picture is Sea Rovers, a pirate game that was pretty good. This guy Van Overbay made it.

Maybe so, Mike, you might well be right that people accepted it because they wanted to see JC in the flesh, and "good enough" had a lower bar than normal for fanbois. I think it was an OK movie. It deserved far better, sort of in the way that Arnold will always be Conan, not some skinny-but-cut pussy who can't act will never be. But it was entertaining, and it was a little bit fun.

The real problem for me is that it was a Disney movie. It needed Ridley Scott. It needed dark as fuck. Death, pain, suffering. Not Disney's version, but real misery. It needed edge. And it got none. I think had someone who does dark film, and a good cinematographer who has a real hard on for Burroughs filmed it, it would've been outstanding.

And yes, whatever that guy's name is, Kutcher Kitchner...totally forgettable. Sad, really. But, it paved the way. I figure in 6 years someone will buy the rights and do it right. Hollywood is plum out of new ideas, and they retread everything on a cycle of 5-10 years now, so I'm thinking they'll do it right.

Or maybe DVD sales will be great, and it will be a big at-home hit. Who knows.

But I ~WANTED~ the movie to be way better than it was, although it wasn't a bad film. Like, I'd call it on par with Battle: Los Angeles or something. But it wasn't THE John Carter movie that the character and Burroughs deserved.

My next great hope is that someone makes a good, truly good, Lovecraft flick. Die Monster Die is about as good as you're going to get at this point. But I'd like to see a John Carpenter "Thing" treatment of "At the Mountains of Madness" or something. That would pretty much absolve Hollywood of many of their recent sins in my book.

EDIT:
I just had an epiphany. If the guy who did Priest, or even maybe the guy who did Mutant Chronicles would've gotten his hands on this, it would've been 10x better.

For Andy:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bTAlgZlqwnQ

Ha ha! Die Monster, Die?

Apparently John Carter is doing well on DVD...and it was a huge hit in Russia, of all places.

I don't think Ridley Scott would have been the right man for the job...believe it or not, I would think that Spielberg or Jackson would be who you would want to make this material relevant to a modern audience. Or maybe go back in time and grab George Lucas circa 1980 to do it. You've got to have somebody in there with an eye for pulp, but also an eye for presenting pulp in a way that gets audiences invested in it regardless of the material.

I think I see where you're coming from though, you're thinking Gladiator.

Sure, he's William Stout; he was the production designer for Return of the Living Dead and Masters of the Universe, a bunch of the design work for the first two Conan movies. He also did the Dragon*Con logo and the Wizards poster that the user Chasch here uses as his avatar. A lot more than that, and that's not exactly what he's proudest of, but those are the most F:AT-type things.

Looking forward to this. Speaking of Magical Athelete and that Richard Garfield website I linked to, I noticed that he did a podcast on Magical Athelete; has anyone listened to it? I'm very curious whether he has any original ideas or understanding about that admittedly very dumb game and why it works (beyond being short, having variability due to the special powers, and tapping into a much-missed-since-childhood joy of rolling dice to race and root for your dude).

My favorite parts of the Simonson Thor are the Casket of Ancient Winters story and, of course, Ragnarok/Surtur. And yeah, I'd put it as better than the contemporaneous but much more well-known Daredevil and X-Men runs.

DOOM! This and the Quitely Batman are pretty much the only comics where you can rave about the *sound effects*.

This demonstrates the difference in coloring pretty well, and I can totally understand people who prefer the new coloring, but to me it obscures the line art and its rough and raw qualities:
Coloring

I *think* I've got a complete run of Simonson Thor up through the end of Ragnarok in original comics, if anyone wants to buy them.

Simonson's work has always been great. What I liked about Thor was that he was returning the comics to the roots of the legend it was based upon (Malekith, Surtur (DOOM!), etc.) but was still wonky enough to do something like Beta Ray Bill. That was one of those moments where you realize that the writer (and artist, fortunately) had a vision for where he was going and he was pursuing it to the end.

I think the best thing Ellis has ever done was Transmet, at least for the first couple years. It's easy to try to dismiss it as precious now, but when it was being printed, it was groundbreaking in many ways. Have to say that I do like Fell, too, if he'd ever get back to doing it.

HOLY SHIT! Do you know how much I completely fucking ADORE your dad's Dinosaurs book? I had it when I was little and I've probably looked through it 1,000 times. I was a big dinosaur kid, and that was my _favorite_ dinosaur book. I saw him at Dragon Con a couple of years ago and actually thanked him for it. Awesome!

Yeah, the Thor books on Comixology are the original coloring. The new coloring (which is kind of weird after reading the old books) appears to be for a recent Omnibus edition. The editions I'm reading are from the older Thor Visionaries collections.

Yeah, I love the "real" Norse stuff...that was really on display in "The Last Viking".

DOOM!

What makes Talisman fun is illusions.
* It's roll-and-move, but the spaces are such that at least a significant percentage of the time you have a choice to make. It's not a big choice, but in the context of the game it let's you march to your own drum. You can be a graveyard-lurking evil character if you want to, and although it doesn't really play much differently than just marching around the board it does have a sort of atmospheric bit of role-playing fun to it.
* The Adventure Cards are persistent when you don't defeat them. This is a pretty big deal, even if it doesn't seem like it. The state of the board is constant evolution. A couple big bad enemies early in the game will keep people away from one part of the board, a particularly alluring location will draw people in. It makes peoples' different play styles come out, and encourage PvP more than a regular old static board.
* The characters are fun. They're creative inside of a generic envelope. The Sorceress could be any old sorceress you remember from your childhood or something completely new. It doesn't matter much, but it's flavour that makes the game more engaging than symmetric pawns.

All those things are illusions. It's still Talisman, and you can still get killed in short order, and people will take your stuff. You don't really have much control at any particular point, you're just struggling to do what you can when you can and be opportunistic.

In Munchkin you can get a similar type of character development feel, but your character isn't inherently different from the guy across the table. He just got better equipment. Sucks to be you. It's not like you're a Goblin Fanatic or Minotaur and are going to to try to club his ass anyway. And if you do start to gain an advantage and pull out in front of the pack it's just because everyone's waiting for the best time to fuck you over. You're better off in second place so everyone blows their "Kill the Leader" cards on the guy ahead of you. But if the leader was smart, he saved his own "Kill the Leader" card to fuck you over too. With the right group it can be fun, but more often than not you just feel like somebody should have won and ended this shit 40 minutes ago.

That's my deep "Fun Games: Talisman vs Munchkin Analysis"

I never read Thor or watched the movie. Saw him in The Avengers. Always thought it would have been some hilariously genius casting if Clay Matthews (of the GB Packers) had played him instead. But I like football, and I digress.

Great article. It is unfortunate that you don't have an answer at the end although I imagine that would be akin to just laying your head on a chopping block and waiting for the nerds to throw axes at it.

What's interesting to me about this notion of fun, after reading your article, is that I can't shake the feeling that Tom Chick is right. All you can do is perfect your technique for describing the process and hope that your audience will be able to tell if it will be fun for them. That you can sort of do, even if you can't tell them if they will have fun individually or not.

Fun may be the most important factor in whether or not I want to play a game, even more than novelty but I don't think making the game more accesible means more fun because for some people it can become too simple and they never enjoy it, they feel like there's no real choices for them to make. I get that and much of my group hates King of Tokyo for that exact reason.

The thing is that fun, to me, is decided much more by the group I'm with. I can play TTR and if everyone is having fun I'll enjoy myself... not for the sake of the group but just plain old enjoy myself. I love to hang out with people who are having fun and any game can accomodate that for me.

Either way, nice article and it's not nearly as pretentious as you make it out to be.

Virtua Fighter was always my favorite fighter. I still play VF4 and I will buy the new one as soon as I can. I know you've said in the past that you hate it but I'm still anxious to see what you say about it. I'm buying it either way. I love how it ignores other fighters and the over the top antics and creates it's own little niche in the genre by going the complete opposite direction.

Ever since I was a kid I wanted a game like that and fell in love with mediocre efforts like Budokan just to get that fix until VF came out and solved my problem.

Incidentally is that you and Vassel in the pic?

It is still the best dinosaur book ever, in my attempt-at-an-unbiased opinion. I think it's also the best thing he ever did, but you don't go around telling your dad that it's been 30 years since his peak, though I do at times try to remind him of what made Dinosaurs work so well, the bold experiments in style and composition and the VERY narrative art. It was not just "here is my best attempt to depict what this dinosaur would have looked like".

Sorry to distract, I definitely want the discussion focused on your article; too often in the last couple months of Cracked LCD I feel like most of the discussion under the Barnestorming is about the movies, comics & music more than the Cracked LCD column, which deserves a lot of discussion that I just don't feel up to at the moment because, well, that shit's just fucking hard! I'm having a hard enough time just sorting out for my own purposes whether I feel like Mare Nostrum is offering something to me that Dune doesn't already, much less thinking about those fun-first games which might require an entirely new way of talking about them.

What is the game with the marvelously large map in the picture?

Is that the "view of a lost era" (or something like that) dinosaur book

As to the article, I think there are some interesting points in there. One of the most interesting you things you said is "rules-to-fun" distance. Obviously, as in the example you gave, this is going to be conditional on many factors -- that's nice because it captures the subjective nature of what "fun first" is to people.

Personally, I think that fun-first is a poor descriptor. It is vacuous to the point of having almost no meaning. A lot of your description in the article alluded to accessibility; however, I don't think that is really it (although it is definitely a consideration). Accessibility is really what gave the whole Euro movement its kick in the pants (a couple of simple rules that are streamlined in effect to make gameplay simple and accessible) -- "here are 2 pages of senior citizen font rules, let's start playing".

Rather, I think probably the best definition is going to be related to the statement you made: "You don’t have to work at being the kid on the back of the box cheering". So, an unconditional fun first game would be one where you would expect to see kids on the box cheering. Basically, we are talking about games targeted at the 8-15 year old boy (Magical Athlete, Thunder Road, Talisman, Chaostle, etc.). If the game wouldn't be comfortable having kids on the box cheering, then it likely isn't unconditionally fun first. And, once we move beyond that to conditional fun first, then anything qualifies.

Wow. I was there for that photo. Probably one of the last times he was seen gaming in public. I've kept him hidden in the closet dungeon since then...

Steve"Luvs teh gimp ball"Avery

Fun-First is a great descriptor. I think it alludes to the idea that a game should be fun, with balance, "~~~elegance~~~" and other bullshit nondescript words taking second seat to that concept.

Chaostle is a perfect example. Take a game that makes no sense, really has no object other than to run around and fuck with people and watch horrible shit happen to them so you can point and laugh, and yet, it is a perfect example of a fun-first that works.

Then you look at Munchkin quest, which isn't that dissimilar...you run around fucking with people, watching bad shit happen so you can point and laugh...but...then they decided to add some extranous rules to "thicken the stew" and the game is utter, and I mean UTTER fucking garbage. Like, the only game I flatly REFUSED to play the required three times just so I could make fun of it in a review.

Sometimes I think that the real difference between euros and 'trash has nothing to do with theme vs. elegance, or accessibility or any of that: One is meant to be a dick-measuring contest between bored intelligent people who are otherwise incapable of competition, and one is something meant to be an enjoyable pastime to have a bunch of fun with friends, with no real emphasis on being "the best".

This article should also have been subtitled:

WARNING: PRETENTIOUS MOVIE WRITING AHEAD

I'd like to hear some more detail on how this movie was so bad besides broad strokes like "confused tone", "ugly design work", "bad acting, bad writing,and bad filmmaking", etc.

There was nothing confusing about the tone. The design and look of the film was great. 'Bad writing?' where? 'Bad filmmaking?' How?

There were three areas this film supposedly fell down on and only two are valid.

First, the valid ones.
1) Mars could have been more red.
2) Stanton's ego did need to get reeled in so that the marketing could have been appropriate.

The one complaint that folks throw out, but is wrong is the acting of the lead. Truthfully, I've only read the first book and found it 'ok'. I never took away that the lead was this dynamic, deep character that only Day-Lewis could do justice to. We was a generic, bare chested pulp hero tough guy. Nothing deep there. A wooden actor that simply looks the part would be fine, so long as the rest of the films carries the story. Many of these pulp movies are like that.

Take the Conan films. It's pretty much universally agreed that Arnold's portrayal of Conan is worse than Mamoa's. However, the Arnold film is clearly superior to the new film because it more accurately portrays the themes and concepts of Conan's world. It's the better 'conan' movie.

Another example is the Indiana Jones films. He's the same idiot in every film, but some films (raiders, last crusade) are rated higher than others not for any reason having to do with the blundering professor in the main role (that's consistent in all three), but for the adventures and characters around the main hero.

So, John Carter the typical pulp hero of the novels is portrayed by an average actor with good looks. No biggie. It is a big deal that all of the other pieces are right, don't discredit that. And this film got a lot right.

Tars Tarkas, Woola, Deja, Kantos, the ships, the costumes, the fact he was still a confederate soldier...all of it on target and great!

I'd say there are even many parts where the movie was _better_ than the books. The explanation behind him transporting to Mars was surely better. The bookend story about Burroughs was neat. The fact that there was some humor was a nice touch.

The other thing I would add in this films defense is that it didn't play softball with the audience. It took a very LotR approach. The characters talked and acted in a very 'realistic' manner. There were no great periods of exposition catching the audience up. You had to decipher who,where,what everything meant. To me, that gave the film some weight and felt like some respect was given to the audience and the license.

Love to hear your views, Michael, but I want to now where all of this 'bad filmmaking' was because I didn't see much wrong with this one.

1) Dungeonquest creates a rich, overarching story that you can enjoy no matter how crappy the game gets. Munchkin doesn't.

2) Dungeonquest plays in less than an hour, and has a fixed end point so it *always* plays in less than an hour. Munchkin doesn't.

These two things are absolutely critical for highly random, low strategy games to work properly. It astonishes me that this basic, basic lesson still hasn't been learned by a surprisingly high number of game designers.

A quick story. I played the Die Zombies Die & Defend the Manor house scenarios from Last Night on Earth several times and loved them: they both conform to the above rules. Then I added the first expansion and tried a scenario which had too many zombies in it and re-spawning heroes and thus broke rule 2, and the game became terrible: dragging, tedious and dull. Haven't played the game since.

Anyway, I'm going to comment on Michael's article over on NHS when I have time.

Being as this is 2012, maybe you could think about including the links to articles you mention that exist on other sites, this seems to be your new style barnesy, and I dont like it!

Yeah, pretty much what Jeff said. John Carter is a fucking pulp action-adventure novel, and the movie was a well done Hollywood Summer Blockbuster action-adventure film (except for the summer and, unfortunately, the blockbusting part). Stop treating it as if it should be anything more. (In fact, the movie at least tried to add some depth to the Carter character with the flashbacks, and it works exceptionally well when he attacks a whole army.)

I dread to think of a potential future movie based on Lovecraft's works. If it stays true to the original material, then it will be fucking boring and pointless (Lovecraft had great and original ideas, but he was a terrible writer, his stories go from nowhere to nowhere, have no pacing, or anything that makes a story enjoyable), and will flop. And if it makes the necessary changes, then the purists will freak out and flood the internet with messages about how awful the movie is, the critics will follow, and (unless word-of-mouth saves it) it will flop.

PS
nice article. The hot air output seems to be on the increase generally, I just don't think games are honestly that worthy of "critical analysis" for its own sake, so am leaning more towards Michael's view about the utility of games being about fun, however that's delivered (some people like serious, calculating games, thats OK). We still dont need to scramble around trying to be the smartest guy in the room. It reminds me of someone who did a Phd at our school on the work of the beatles. Sure, I suppose it was really good, and he analysed all kinds of aspects of their music, but hey, if you like it, just play it on and enjoy it. I think there are a lot of parallels to music. Play what you like, you dont need to understand the harmonic progressions involved or just how super clever the arrangement of minor third augmented fourths is. Who cares, really? I'm a lot more interested firstly in just playing the god damn games, secondly, listening to people who can say why they like a game in an interesting way, or have charisma themselves, and what features of the game stand out, so I can decide myself if I might like it. Bottom line, games are not, whatever some people would love to believe, worthy of academic level discussion. An "expert" in what makes board games tick needs to remember that to all intents and purposes, he's still a nerd that only a handful of people want to listen to, as on the whole "nobody cares".

Very interesting Cracked LCD there. Especially compared to what Matt Drake posted on his blog the very same day:

Which I think really cuts to the crux of the matter. Fact is, serious, professional critics for pretty much all other media don't discuss how fun a movie or album or what-have-you is. Maybe some video game critics still do, but I think even there it's not especially common. And maybe it shouldn't be.

Let me just paraphrase what you wrote in your column, but in regards to John Carter, a movie at which I was absolutely delighted...

Now I suppose you could raise several objections to that statement, based on your experience with John Carter. And at the end of the day, I'd ignore them, because I had fun with the movie.

That isn't to say John Carter deserves critical accolades and high praise. I doubt it will be regarded as "important" in the long run. But I think that goes back to Matt Drake's point, which is that for the vast majority of cases, these games aren't "important" and neither are the reviews about them.

Which pretty much implies that if we want a critical discussion that is more than folks sitting around spouting their opinions on what they personally enjoyed, there needs to be a set of critical standards that at least aspire to some measure of objectivity and there needs to be games that meet them.

Or we just call a spade a spade and admit that when we're talking about how fun a game is, we're shooting the shit and not aspiring to some greater critical ideal.

Look y'all Michael had his first online geekgasm! Awwwww, our Mikey is a geek after all.

On LCD article: this was for me a revelation about certain things I didn't get about Michael's reviews, like why this weird fondness for thematic games full of mechanical ballast and garbage (like MEQ), apparently it seems that there was no serious reason to dislike them in a review. I'm glad there's a change on the horizon (and would be happier if it came a couple of years earlier, like before I bought MEQ).

As a theatre reviewer I was taken aback by the timidity of the article. It tries to push for certain things, I'd have though to be long ago resolved. First of all a review is for me never about what a piece of art (or a game) IS, the IS is only realised in the experience of a viewer/reader/gamer, it does not exist on its own. Hence we question what a work DOES, what is its EFFECT on the audience. In this frame there's no qualitative difference between the work that produces this effect (serious thinky) or that effect (bizzarly funny). So yes, there's obviously a way to write about the "smarty" and the "ballsy" games on the same level. Of course, I expect some obstacles or angles one must understand when going for this strategy of writing, like: is specific fun-first design more open and hence relies on a particular kind of group to deliver what it can offer, whereas a smartish design is more closed and delivers more or less the same experience with any gamer willing to put effort in? Thinking about audiences first, which what this is about, is also about understanding that games seek for a certain kind of effort to deliver - if you say that "thinky" games require work in order to produce fun, I'd say it's the same for "fun-first" games, only that the work is not so evident, but it's there and is needed in order for the game to deliver: group's atmosphere, player's attitudes, gaming preferences and so on.

Secondly, the questions of inventiveness, originality and so on. This presupposes some values which are values of what exactly? - Belief in games as achievements on their own and ignoring their interactiveness and their need to be complete only with people playing them. Originality and inventiveness make me go "oho", but that's an afterthought and not part of me actually experiencing the game. The question is whether this original or inventive trick works for a game and is part of its whole game experience. Maybe old tricks create new experience, maybe new tricks don't quite work, or maybe it's good old trick creating a confidently solid experience. But let's say we skip this "good for what it is" part and question about reviewer's agenda. I believe each good reviewer should have one, so that would be one to go about review's push for new mechanics as they think it will push the game design forward. For me it's a question of time and context - reviewer notices a lack of attention to some facets of gaming and pushes for them, and these can change. So sometimes it's push for innovative mechanics, but sometimes it's a push for more open or more fulfilling player experiences.

About the Fun-First Design article:

Maybe I misunderstood something, but the general message sounds suspiciously like "in the case of games, where the designer's goal was only to create a fun little game, the reviewer shouldn't concern himself with the analysis of mechanical details, he should just describe how much fun he had, because anything more is missing the point".

If that's really the case, then I couldn't disagree more.

If I want to know whether or not a game is going to be fun for me, I'm better off just looking up how the majority of those, who enjoy more-or-less the same games that I do, rated it. Or, better yet, I just try it at my FLGS with people I usually have fun over boardgames. (Of course, the latter is not an option to everyone, unfortunately.)

No offense, but professional game reviewer or not, Barnes's opinion about the fun-factor of a game is just one out of the hundreds of other players' opinion on it. From a review, and especially a professional review, I expect a bit more, like the examination of how the game creates the atmosphere of fun. And that requires the analysis of mechanics, even if there's nothing really new in them.

For example, Talisman is fun (for me, at least). But it's not fun simply because the designer didn't give a shit about being balanced, inventing smart combat/resource management mechanics, and packing a shitload of tactical/strategical decisions into the game. Let me assure you, I (or anyone else) could design a game with the exact same attitude in ten minutes, that would be about as much fun as watching the paint dry on the wall.

So, again, for example in the case of Talisman, there's plenty of space for mechanical analysis, without missing the point of the game. E.g. the reviewer can mention that the game starts with providing almost no real choices at all, but as it goes along, the board fills with monsters, and it helps to build up tension. Or, that by having a very simple combat system, it makes it easy for players to follow what happens to the others, involving them in their stories as well, and, at the beginning of combat, it lets them calculate quickly what number their opponent needs to roll to fail/succeed (this is something, that is sorely missing from Runebound), so they can root against him, and immediately cheer or boo according to the result. And so on. These are just a few mechanical details that make Talisman a fun game, that are worth pointing out in a review.

Well, at least we finally hit the bogey: "Pretensious game writing ahead"

Again all this talk about "critical game writing". It's a nice thought and all, but, only like 1000 people on the planet will read it. It is the definition of TL;DR. For example, this:
http://www.boardgamegeek.com/blogpost/11391/initial-impressions-on-david-shorts- ground-floor

It goes to great lengths to attempt to be very thinky, but in effect, it's just mind-numbingly boring to read. I mean, most of these kinds of articles go into great detail about things that most people don't really give a fuck about; if you read the commentary, it's pretty much "thanks, it seems like something I'd like/not like" which is EXACTLY the same comments that every fucker who ever wrote a line of text about a game gets.

Critical game writing is more about what Michael did here. That's what the market will read. Things that help define parlance for other writers and reviewers. Now that Mike has defined "Fun-First" with examples, sort of like many years back when he started talking about "Emergent Gameplay", people will then look back to those words as guidance. That's where critical writing is at - about games in general, not specifics.

This industry is a consumerist driven business where it all comes down to people reading reviews for the SOLE purpose of making buying decisions. The vast majority (and by vast, I mean 99.99%) of folks don't care about "how a game affects the industry", they want to know, from a subjective and adjective-filled standpoint, what a game does and why they should like/hate it. How else could the vast legion of bloggers exist otherwise?

The review is as much a product as the game itself; you have to give the market what it wants or it will not "sell". For a blogger/web writer, a review that is ridiculously long, overreaching, or boring will simply not be read. The last 10 lines maybe.

Proof positive: how many people watch an entire video review? How many read an entire "Ender's Game" review? Fucking NOBODY, hardly. Because people use reviews as tools to justify their interest in something, no more, no less. Going further on an individual game product is a nice thought, but invariably, people "skim" because it's not what they want. This article that Mike wrote, it's where the "critical writing" should be going, not individual game reviews.

This is NOT theatre. It's a different type of people. People read Broadway reviews and want to hear fanciful adjectives to make them feel more elite, or to further enlighten them. They're certainly not read (by and large) by social outcasts who spend most of their leisure time sitting in a basement "man cave" gnashing their teeth over whether to move their Daimyo or build more archers. It's a different mindset, different kind of person.

The one thing I DO agree with is that reviewers should have an agenda. What I don't agree with is the idea that we're to "push game design forward" because it would be both a fool's errand and ridiculously conceited to believe that we have that power. It is, and always has been, the MARKET which moves ideas. What people buy is what makes designs expand. Our power is to influence buying decisions, which can affect design only in that we can sell games. But just TALKING about it won't have Reiner or Wolfgang or Vlaada go sit on their bedside and lament that the host of bloggers are not saying their games were "emergent" enough. Get the fuck out of here. Maybe in some fantasy universe, but in the real world, money talks. Publisher buy designs primarily on past history: what sold, or they punt, and that punt is based on their own testing of the design.

But the agenda should be to promote nothing, anyhow. The agenda should always be this: to accurately report on a product, describe it well enough to endow the reader with the information required to understand the product, and then elicit the feeling we get when playing it and our overall opinion on it. That is the only reason to write about games; to save people money by weeding out the shitty ones, which in the long run will help publishers decide whether or not to print a game or not.

Do you not think it coincidental that BGG reviews of shit like Fresco and other completely derivative, bullshit cube pushers are almost all positive and that a continuous waterfall of the same fucking games keep squirting from the rearmost orifice of publishers? It's a MARKET DRIVEN publishing cycle. Fresco comes out, gets awesome reviews, and before you know it, even Wizards of the Coast is squirting out cube games.

It's not theatre, where some designer is trying to make an artistic impact, and damn the dollars. It's a business. People make games to make money, and grow their business. There's just no correlation between theatre or "high art" writing and what we do. People aren't buying games because of the artistic impact. They buy them as a consumer, a viral, unashamedly obsessive consumer bent on being the first in their group to have the latest Hotness.

Wice, I don't think Michael would ever advocate ignoring mechanical detail. That's a piss-poor way to go about game criticism. But when a game ends up entertaining and making people enjoy themselves despite mechanical "flaws," a lot of criticism can be rendered invalid by the simple declaration that a game is fun.

Like he says, games aren't like movies in the sense that if a game isn't fun to play, it's failed some basic test. A movie could be very difficult but still very enlightening. But because games actually require some effort to play and teach, they aren't really good to anyone if they aren't fundamentally enjoyable. It'd be like having a movie that can't actually be projected. What's the point?

Michael, it seems like a lot of these epiphanies are driven by your particular group. I don't have a set group that meets very consistently. Instead I run in 3 or 4 different game circles, usually a different one every week. So the idea of fun in groups I play with can be all over the map. I'd be curious to see how it would work to have a set group of 5-6 people who just play together on a weekly basis.

I signed on here today and thought "shit, I've got a lot of responses to write." But Sgosaric, Adam, and Wice...everything you guys wrote ties in very specifically to another idea I'm developing, as does what Drake wrote. So sit tight for that. But I think there's a definite reason- and not a very encouraging one- as to why there is so much dissonance about the notion of serious games criticism, the idea of "fun", the role of the reviewer, and the potential of the medium. It's also the reason why this particular article is fairly inconclusive and almost entirely subjective.

So I'm excusing myself for the time being, until next week or the week after. But thanks so much for the discussion, I really appreciate hearing what you guys have to say. I'm a big fan of creating dialogue and working out this stuff collectively, so disagreement and alternate viewpoints are what I'm looking for.

Pete, I think you've got either a very cynical or a very plebian perspective on the idea of games as art. I get where you're coming from, but I don't believe that we should be short-changing the _possibility_ for games to be more, do more, and express more. As much as I love and encourage fun-first design concepts, I think we do have room for a game designer that's more Bergman than Bay and for games that are more challenging and questioning. Like, why has there never been a wargame with a subtext that causes the player to question _why_ they like playing as the Nazis or a horror game that causes the player to seriously reflect on the nature of death?

Other mediums can bear this kind of expression- so why not games?

Some of that answer, I think, is in my thoughts right now.

Oh, and Michael, what game are you guys playing in that picture?

At one point someone took a picture of a bunch of us laughing and shouting over a game of Puerto Rico. It was ridiculous, I'm not sure what happened to that picture.

I cant believe I find myself agreeing with pete, again

Since it seems like a lot of other people were wondering too!

Sounds like we've come full circle:

2006: Games are being looked at too analytically and the most important aspect, fun, is being overlooked.

Now: Games are being looked at too analytically and the most important aspect, fun, is being overlooked.

This is what I mean, Mike:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transgressional_fiction

This term was coined by a reviewer, but not in a review. My point is that there is a place for serious game criticism, but it's not in reviewing individual games, whereas in theatre there is a calling for that sort of thing.

And cynical, no. Pikey? Did you say I might be a pikey, you fuck? :) No.

I'm a realist. You have no power other than to persuade people to like or not like something during a review. And that's it. Don't think that there's a hundred designers who are going to sit and think deeply about your thoughts on Sentinels of the Multiverse are or that Jesse Dean somehow really changed the world of game design with his beating of MArtin Wallace.

Money talks. Game companies may have been founded by passion, but they're run on dollars.

Looks like the article is being discussed on BGG as well:
http://www.boardgamegeek.com/blogpost/11401/barnes-and-the-red-herring-of-fun

As for Jeff's defense of John Carter...if the film weren't John Carter and was a wholly original idea, you'd be left with a picture that isn't that much less laughable or poorly made as Battlefield Earth...albeit without the Scientiology nonsense to make it even worse.

It's badly cast, badly acted, flat, uninteresting, and poorly paced. There's not much of a sense of adventure. It takes itself far too seriously sometimes and not seriously enough at others. It wants to be a big Gladiator-style epic, but then the scenes with Woola (which are literal and faithful to the book) look like something out out of a live action Road Runner cartoon. But then it wants to be a light swashbuckler, but it gives that up. That what I mean by the tone being confused...it never seems to commit to an approach.

The design is ugly and dull, and I found some of the more high-tech stuff to be pretty incongrous with how I imagined Barsoomian tech. The Tharks look fine, but they also look no less ridiculous than the Na'vi.

I feel like very little actual drama or story occurs over the course of the two hours and change film. Yeah, I get it. Carter goes to Mars and "finds out who he really is" and all that. But I honestly can't remember any key dramatic moments or beats other than that Thark slaughter, where he's realizing his potential...too bad it's spoiled by silly flashbacks that make it more maudlin than awesome.

The film needed an _iconic_ figure in the lead. Like a Schwarzeneggar as Conan lead. Carter is a larger than life, man's man character. This guy was not that at all. They may as well have cast Jake Gyllenhall. I didn't like _any_ of the actors in their roles, and in fact I barely remember them other than the girl that played Deja Thoris, and I found her portrayal unattractive and like most things about the film, dull. Wait, weren't the Red Martians completely naked all the time?

The decision to make Mars yellow was apparently based on some kind of scientific assumption that it's more yellow. This was a mistake. It needed to be RED. It needed to have a highly stylized, fantasy look. It didn't need to look like a Hercules movie. The sets were boring and created no sense of atmosphere. They felt like sets, and the actors looked like actors on sets. There wasn't a holistic sense of vision at all.

Some of it is the director. He didn't know what he was doing with this material, and I don't think he had a sense of when to pull back and say "hey, you know, some of this shit is really silly". I also think there's an issue where stuff that was written in a pulp adventure novel simply doesn't look that great in a $250 million film.

I really wish that it had just been a Pixar film, as was suggested at one point. With a more illustrative, expressive style and less of a sense of "we're makin' an EPIC", it might have been closer to the classic adventure tone it needed.

Bottom line- if you weren't invested in John Carter, I doubt you'd be as doe-eyed about it.

Wice, I don't think Michael would ever advocate ignoring mechanical detail. That's a piss-poor way to go about game criticism. But when a game ends up entertaining and making people enjoy themselves despite mechanical "flaws," a lot of criticism can be rendered invalid by the simple declaration that a game is fun.

Yes, exactly. This is why I pointed out that the mechanical parts are really the technical artistry of game design. And I think my Abaddon review more or less embodies the idea that criticism of elements can be invalidated by the experience.

Like he says, games aren't like movies in the sense that if a game isn't fun to play, it's failed some basic test. A movie could be very difficult but still very enlightening. But because games actually require some effort to play and teach, they aren't really good to anyone if they aren't fundamentally enjoyable. It'd be like having a movie that can't actually be projected. What's the point?

Right again. There is an issue of spectatorship. The degree to which a game is incomplete without being played _unlike any other medium_ also creates problems with the "unfun" game.

Michael, it seems like a lot of these epiphanies are driven by your particular group. I don't have a set group that meets very consistently. Instead I run in 3 or 4 different game circles, usually a different one every week. So the idea of fun in groups I play with can be all over the map. I'd be curious to see how it would work to have a set group of 5-6 people who just play together on a weekly basis.

I really just have two games gangs and one of them I've not been frequent at lately due to baby jail. But yes, absolutely, some of it is driven by playing with a specific group of people...which again, loops into this idea I have that may make all games writing...POINTLESS! ;-)

Pete, I couldn't disagree more, to the point where I don't even know where to start. But since you seem to be ALL about the "buy or not buy decision", which is sad and cynical but whatever, think of it in the following way: you claim that a review should just describe the game and give the reviewer's thumbs up or thumbs down, because this is the most useful purchase aid. Even on the purchase-aid level, I totally disagree: deeper thinking about games, ESPECIALLY deeper discussion of the games I already own and like or don't like and what makes them work or not, helps me with ALL future purchase decisions as it helps me understand better what to look for in a game. Your reviews are like fish that aren't even always edible; the best reviews are teaching me how to fish for myself.

This little tidbit was great, and shows how you don't have to throw up your hands and give up when writing about "dumb fun"; it's exactly this analysis that I think is the next step in game criticism (analysis of more serious games and analysis of strategic depth is plenty well-covered):

I disagree that there's SO much of a difference; if a movie critic has fun watching a movie, they probably think it's a good movie, and it's still their job to explain WHY. The same goes for games: if all you see is a bunch of flaws in a game and yet you still have fun with it, if you want to write anything relevant on the game then it's your job to look harder and figure out what it was that was different that made it fun for you. Ending with "all the flaws are invalid because it's fun" ain't cool; "all the flaws are invalid because it's fun BECAUSE here are the good things it does to invalidate those flaws" is fine and great.

I would agree with that last part, although as a reviewer it's very difficult to articulate why some stuff works and other stuff doesn't. But yeah, just saying something is fun and leaving it at that isn't much good to anybody. I firmly believe that not everything needs to have a reason in a game, but even in that case it's more interesting to read how the reviewer arrived at that conclusion. I'm okay with inconclusiveness, but it still has to show some consideration and thought.

I totally agree with that last statement: a good writer will explain WHY they found a game fun. That's EXACTLY what I am saying. But I'm saying that writing a 1500 word thesis on why a game is emergent or breaks a mold in some way is fine too, but as a REVIEW, in the REVIEW context, it will be glossed over.

I am saying to separate "reviews" of a game and "in-depth commentary". It's different audiences who will appreciate them for different reasons.

And "sad and cynical"? Be real! You motherfuckers really believe, REALLY, that this hobby is SO MUCH MORE? So amazingly profound? That we, as board gamers are SPECIAL? Get the fuck out. Everyone loves their hobby. At least people who knit or draw CREATE something. All we do is consume in this hobby. So, and I say this with the greatest of respect, "Nigga Pleez."

Allow me to elaborate, since you are not getting what I am saying (and this means all of you, apparently):

There IS IS IS IS a place for deeper criticism and writing about games. Mike fills that niche like very few others do. Shit, once I actually wrote a decent article on the subject. But the fact is that Mike Pondsmith is not going to take a GAME REVIEW from someone and make it "required reading". Chris Petersen is Not going to read a review of Talisman and make decisions on publishing based upon its profound exploration of the roll and move mechanic and its role in gaming today. If you think so, go fucking ask. Because I have, and you know what? Colby, Mike Mindes, other game publishers are NOT reading your reviews as a guide. They are looking at their own tastes, feedback from their own game groups, and WHAT HAS SOLD.

So, AGAIN, I REITERATE, the only power that a product (PRODUCT, NOT ARTISTIC) reviewer who reviews a PRODUCT for PUBLIC CONSUMPTION has is the power of public opinion. That's it.

Don't agree, that's fine. We can part ways on the matter as friends. But I'm telling you that it is presumtive and egotistical to believe that a guy doing a review of a new game (Banditos, for example) is going to have his article read in its entirety if he spends 1000 words waxing poetic about how the concept that cards as money in a randomized fashion is a design mistake rather than simply describe the game, give the reasons he likes it or not, gives the overall concept of the game, and maybe tosses in a few lines about the "impact". To think otherwise is folly. It will be skimmed, at best, and the argument will not be about the article itself as much as people arguing about the responses without actually READING the article, as pointed out in the BGG thread that that dickweed put up about Barnes' Fun-First article. I mean, look at the reponses! Nobody read it...they just want to argue.

You want proof? How's this on for size:

Why is Kickstarter so popular? Why do many games go through it now? These games are sold to fools, sight unseen, hook line and sinker. A video with some asshole talking about how awesome the game MIGHT BE is enough for people to plonk down 80$.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/michaelmindes/kings-of-air-and-steam-a- steampunk-themed-board-ga

These cocksuckers have 41,000$ in NEW SALES based on a SHITTY video and a storyboard. Do the 626 backers who dropped money on this REALLY want to read about how "pick-up-and-deliver is an overused crutch mechanic that dates back (blah de blah blah)..." and the academic side? FUCK NO. They want shiny new. They want neat theme. And most of all, they want to be the biggest dick on the block for taking the risk and being the first of their circlejerkers to own the LATEST GREATEST SHINYPRECIOUS.

To think otherwise is folly, and in every way discernably false.

We are NOT interpretive dance. We are not film. Games do NOT explore deeper meanings and tell stories, by and large. They are pastimes. They are a way to prove who is superior to some, a reason for friends to meet and share time to others, and are a reason to get pissed and sleep on a buddy's couch for some. They are NOT something that will shape culture. They are very, very rarely even close to being art, while there is true art inside the box. The designing of the game is the art form, but the final product is a consumer product, not art.

Game reviewers are here as a filter for the masses; to act as guardians of the faith, to keep publishers honest, to destroy false hype, to honestly assess each individual game and report, accurately, and without agenda, what it does, how it does it, and if it is a wise notion to drop money.

That's a GAME REVIEWER. A critical writer, something else entirely.

Real film criticism, not reviews, has ZERO direct impact on studio decisions or box office. But it does have an impact on the people making films, and therefore it has a huge impact on film. Game criticism is the same way: sure, it might not affect how much money a game makes, but it'll affect the people making games if it helps them think about more deeply about design. And on a more personal level, criticism generally increases my enjoyment of both movies and games.

There seems to be this weird belief being expressed that "great art" has to be focused on deep and serious meanings. I'll be honest, I'm not really interested in the Ingmar Bergman of games. But that's absolutely not the only incarnation of "great art": I would LOVE to see the "Singin' in the Rain" of games (Cosmic Encounter?). I don't think anyone would claim that Singin' "explores deeper meanings", as Pete put it; but I think a great number of film critics WOULD consider it great art. We can have great art in games without them getting too serious, though it admittedly doesn't happen too often; I can only think of one hobby game that I believe has achieved this, and even then only a particular part of it (surprise surprise, Magic: the Gathering, and specifically Time Spiral block, which even the designer has called his commercially unsuccessful artfilm; they're definitely more interested in making blockbusters).

Ahh, once again in both the NoHighScores article here on F:At Mr. Barnes subtly points to managing the customer's expectations, both in games and films.

Most customers take a solid look at the box cover and instructions prior to sitting down to play the game, and these are the places that publishers can set the tone. The rulebook for Galaxy Trucker is a particular favorite not because it's so clear and concise, but because it puts you in the proper frame of mind to sit down to the game. Someone coming to Galaxy Trucker expecting intense play is quickly corrected, and their first play of the game is far more likely to hit them from the right direction (and yes, I did that on purpose). The same can be done for more serious titles. I'd wager everyone that reads this can tell a story about a game that wasn't anything like they expected. Not bad, just so counter to expectations that they didn't enjoy their first play.

"John Carter" speaks the same message, where the marketing of the film up front seemed to be run out of the trunk of someone's car and frankly, incorrectly set a proper tone.

Having your product purchased by the right people and left behind by the wrong can make all the difference in the world. Your "product" is the whole shebang -- marketing, advertising and presentation included.

Of course NoHighScores.com is well aware of this -- it's the reason no direct link to the article is included here. I fumbled around on their site through four or five pages finding it, and saw several interesting ads that I "clicked through" on the way. Genius I tell you, genius.

Either that or Barnes just screwed up again like he does for every goddamned Worthpoint article he's ever written.

S.

1) All games are designed to be "fun", with the possible exception of that game about loading Jews on to trains during the holocaust. Even if you perceive a game to be primarily focused on "interesting" mechanics, or multi-player solitaire puzzle elements, the designer of that game finds those aspects of gaming fun. People who play Caylus, High Frontier, Space Hulk, Risk, Monopoly... do so because they have fun doing it. So I think the term "fun first" is kind of pointless because it's inclusive of all games by definition.

2) The quality of a game for me is based on how much the designer can maximize the fun elements (whatever those are) while minimizing the not fun elements. It's a sliding scale. For some, reducing downtime, player elimination, randomness, fiddly-ness, etc... gets rid of aspects of gaming that detract from the fun of a game. Voila. The elegance of euro games is born. For others, preserving player interaction, theme/setting, tension, and complexity are more important than elegance and ease of play. I don't think anyone in either camp would contend that downtime is a "fun" element, however. It's just more or less significant to the fun factor for different gamers. My favorite games (Ameritrash/Euro hybrids and Wargame/Euro hybrids) try to preserve the best of both worlds. I think that Mage Knight is a very fun game, especially solo, where the not-fun element of downtime isn't an issue. Others might see the complexity, rule book(s), puzzle qualities, as enough of a detraction from the fun to move it to the not-fun side of the continuum.

3) Reviewers. Reviewers have a tough time putting a grade on the fun-ness of a game, mainly because it means different things to different people. Some reviewers get around this problem by avoiding qualitative opinions about games at all, mainly giving rules and component overviews, and basically making themselves irrelevant by refusing to have an opinion beyond "strong 7". Others have staked out their territory firmly in one camp or the other showing their bias against "mindless dice-fests" or "soulless cube-pushers". I tend to ignore these people. They're really only useful if you find one who matches your tastes almost exactly. There are a few reviewers (Barnes is one) who have a depth of experience and thought that makes them credible to review a variety of games based on a variety of fun types. So High Frontier and Abaddon both get good scores because Barnes can see the relative fun qualities in both. He might use words like "important" or "emergent" to describe it, but he really means "fun of a different kind". It might seem elitist to some to say that one reviewer is objectively better than another, but those are the kinds of reviewers I want. Just like I wouldn't have much respect for a music critic who didn't appreciate Bach, Charlie Parker, and the Beatles for different reasons.

(also ldsbomber, I have a book called The Beatles as Musicians that goes through their career from Rubber Soul on and analyzes the song construction, music theory, equipment, recording processes, etc.. that they used in making their records. I find that book to be a lot of FUN)

Obviously, we're simply going to disagree on john Carter, but I do have a few more thoughts. One, I recall that you didn't watch JC in one sitting so perhaps you were distracted while viewing or the focus simply wasn't there.

Regardless, you had to know that there wasn't going to be full-frontal male nudity. Even if it was rated R you weren't going to see dudes' junk swinging around Barsoom. You can't knock the film for that. But even so, you can't criticize the film when it doesn't stay faithful to the books, but then criticize it for being 'silly' (woola, the look of the Tharks) when it does.

You didn't like _any_ actors in their roles? James Purfoy stole every scene his Kantos Khan was in and his 'escape' scene is an instant classic. (Granted Purfoy as Carter would have been _much_ better and give the movie a more Errol Flynn feel, but Hollywood underutilizes Purfoy as it is...I don't expect a change there anytime soon). How about William Defoe? Didn't like his Tars Tarkas? He nailed it! Ciarán Hinds brought Rome's Caesar back and it was a treat to see him and Marc Anthony (Purfoy) reunited. I even preferred this Deja over book Deja 9 times out of 10. I thought the actress (forgot the name, but not the face) did a fantastic job in her role which is far better than the 'damsel in distress' of the original. Yeah, another improvement over the book. At any rate there were plenty of finely acted characters.

You know thinking about it more, this move reminds me of another pulp movie that was trashed....Flash Gordon. Sam Jones was not a good Flash Gordon, but damn if Brian Blessed, Max Von Sydow, Timothy Dalton and company didn't make up for it. So, again, a not so good actor in the lead, but good adventure and great characters filling out the film adds up to a fun flick in my book.

As for being vested? I was hardly a fan of the book, but enjoyed this movie tremendously. On the other hand, I was big comic book kid in the 80s and loved the Avengers film, but as time has passed I find the Avengers to not be very memorable whereas I still want to watch JC.

Look at the greatest games, say, Chess and Go. Played by thousands of players, for thousands of years. How many "critical analysis" books or articles have you seen? I'm sure some exist but not many, overwhelmingly they are strategy and playing guides, aimed at enhanced performance in playing the game. If there's no need for critical analysis of why a game like Go or Chess is great, there sure as hell is no call for similar treatments of Ora fucking Labora, that's for realz.

And how many "it's fun" or "it's not fun" books or articles have you seen about Go and Chess? Turns out we don't need them either.

With Chess and Go, they are in large part great due to the strategic depth. This is why I say that what we need is more analysis/discussion of the SHALLOW games, because for many gamers, strategic depth is in and of itself fun, so yeah, there's no need to discuss why Chess and Go are fun once you've established that they have ridiculous depth. But personally, I'd love to see an analysis of those two from a game design perspective; Oware is plenty deep, as is Checkers, so why don't more people obsess over those? Here's an example of such an article that I found enlightening a while back:
http://www.thegamesjournal.com/articles/DefiningtheAbstract.shtml

From the sound of it, that Skaff Elias & Richard Garfield book is also going to tackle the question of why the ancient games, including sports, have endured, what makes them fun.

Real film criticism, not reviews, has ZERO direct impact on studio decisions or box office. But it does have an impact on the people making films, and therefore it has a huge impact on film. Game criticism is the same way: sure, it might not affect how much money a game makes, but it'll affect the people making games if it helps them think about more deeply about design. And on a more personal level, criticism generally increases my enjoyment of both movies and games.

This really gets at the difference between "consumer product review" and "criticism".There is a WIDE gulf of distinction, and it's an area that video games writing in particular struggles with. A piece of criticism analyzing the male gaze, contextualization of violence, or player agency in regard to a particular design or subset of designs is INFINITELY more valuable and useful to folks that make games than "you should buy this game, the graphics are good and it has cool weapons". But unfortunately, most video games writing is like that.

There are theoriticians, academicians, and thinkers in the field though, and if you LIKE digging a little deeper than "should you buy this game", this kind of material is going to have more value to you. I do think it's very cynical and short-sighted to write off games writing as "should you play this game".

I wonder if we would find that the folks that like to read- and in fact get a lot of value out of- the more critical, theoretical games writing are coming from different mediums. I'm coming from film and to a lesser extent music. I like serious writing in those mediums, and reading it enhances my experience with them.

There seems to be this weird belief being expressed that "great art" has to be focused on deep and serious meanings. I'll be honest, I'm not really interested in the Ingmar Bergman of games. But that's absolutely not the only incarnation of "great art": I would LOVE to see the "Singin' in the Rain" of games (Cosmic Encounter?). I don't think anyone would claim that Singin' "explores deeper meanings", as Pete put it; but I think a great number of film critics WOULD consider it great art. We can have great art in games without them getting too serious, though it admittedly doesn't happen too often; I can only think of one hobby game that I believe has achieved this, and even then only a particular part of it (surprise surprise, Magic: the Gathering, and specifically Time Spiral block, which even the designer has called his commercially unsuccessful artfilm; they're definitely more interested in making blockbusters).

This is a great comment, although I would argue that Singin' in the Rain actually does have some very compelling subtexts very specifically about the transition in Hollywood from silent pictures to the sound era and also the artifice of stardom. It's hardly just a singin' and dancing, Gold Diggers of 1933 revue. That said, it's a very artful film yet it manages to be extremely populist and appealing to mindsets that aren't looking for those rascally DHMs.

Cosmic is as good an example as any. It's hardly a serious game at all. It actively encourages silliness and light-hearted play. But the design is tremendously artful. There's also an interesting component where EON wrote _just enough_ of a game to let the players do the rest, and in that restraint there's evident artistry. But you can play Cosmic, have fun, and never think about the genius of the design. That's how most people likely recieve that design and before the advent of the internet and overthinking every game into the ground, that's how everyone likely played it. Without ever thinking "wow, this is a clever design".

Alright, so let's read this concept in the opposite direction. From four years ago --

If nothing else I'll give you an A for consistency, for your review of Android was pretty glowing as long as no one paid attention to what you thought about playing it. In spite of all the gushing, you voted it down on one primary issue -- lifeless play. It wasn't fun. If I recall you had to stand in the corner guns blazing on this one because your only justification for the heavily negative review was "it didn't work."

Did your prior review of Android come to mind as you were writing this week's article?

S.

You're touching on something I find interesting...Cosmic is so open-ended that there's a desire by most people I know to start fiddling with it - add new powers, flares, change the ones that are there. Certainly not everyone gets into this sort of thing, but this ability to be a sort of co-creator of the game so easily and to really own it in that way is something unique to boardgames.

This is the biggest wankerous, circlejerkiest thread ever. I hate to be the one to point it out, but really, it is.

I'm dead set on the idea that there's very limited demand for the kind of writing Mike is talking about when it comes to "reviews with substance", or "reviews with deeper meaning". There simply isn't. IF there was, it would be out there, and people would be clamoring. So far, I count like 5 people on this site who are clamoring. Maybe 10. Maybe another 50 on BGG. But by and large, it's not really wanted. People (consumers) want to know why/what/yum or yuck. The meme TL:DR exists for a reason.

But, if there is a real demand, then fucking do it! Stop gnashing your teeth and lamenting about the dearth of good writing. If you want to see it, then fucking do it. It's like bitching that your gas tank is empty while sitting at a gas station with a fistful of cash. This site, BGG, Blogspot...just fucking write the articles then. Why is there a dearth? Because you guys would rather whine about it than do something about it. Either that, or you're all disingenuous effete game snobs who are keen on talking the talk but know that I'm right, nobody will read it.

Prove me wrong. Write some high-end Nordstrom's articles about a game. The gauntlet has been cast. All of you who are bitching, get off your recliners, crack your knuckles, and review something. And not an easy game, pussies, make it a good, clean Ameritrash game. How about one like Siege of the Citadel. Or Tannhauser. Or Incursion. Write a truly critical, high-end article. Post it to BGG. Post it here. Post it on Rumpus Room or On Gamer's Games. Let's just see how many people rush to stand in line to read it.

Shit or get off the pot. For 4 months at least I've heard this whining, and yet Mike's the only one to do anything about it, and really, only maybe once or twice, this article included. Put your money where your mouth is. Change doesn't happen by wishing it. You want to change the culture, change the conversation, then do it. Stop talking about it and whining about it.

Pete I don't get why you are so focused on their being this "audience" for it. In other media, 99% of the people are also looking for the TLDR "Should I buy it?" answer, so why should this be different and why should that stop people from writing those reviews?

Oh, you misunderstand. I'm absolutely fine with someone taking their time to write a 4000 word essay on Flash Point and how it exemplifies randomness in boardgaming, how it dehumanized the concept of people being burned alive by using unrealistic tokens, et. cetera. I'm all for freedom to do it.

What I am saying is that the audience is limited.

And what I am also saying is that for several months, if not a year, (if not longer) people have been fucking whining about it. MartinQWERTY over on BGG. Jesse Dean. Others.

So, I say to them: SHUT THE FUCK UP. DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT. It's easy to be a fat pussy and whine about it. It's simple to get all pissed that nobody takes you seriously and that you think there's "more to be done". But GET THE FUCK ON WITH IT. DO IT ALREADY. Stop telling other people that you don't like the fact they don't do in-depth reviews and SHOW US THE MONEY, BITCHES.

I'm just sick of every other thread about a game (in this case, not so, but usually) getting bogged down with lamentations about how we need in-depth criticism. Shut up about it and do it already.

QWERTY is on that shit, he did a "Voice Of Experience" or some such named contest. And here's how it went:
http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/814466/voice-of-experience-spring-2012- review-contest-r/page/1

The winner:
http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/809143/voice-of-experience-performative-co- op-vs-immers

41 thumbs. Issued June 2nd.

Here's why I know the whole idea is bullshit:

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/809708/earth-reborn-the-miniatures-mission- simulator-sa

44 thumbs. Issued May 30 (2 days prior)

Why is it that a self-professed hack ass writer like me, who cares far more about writing an entertaining and reasonably informative article than an in-depth article can get more traction? I mean, the guy put up this big contest, big hooplah, and had a bunch of guys all do reviews to see who could really nail it. He was giving away shit! There was "advertising"! And his review was about 2 of the most popular games ever: Pandemic and Arkham Horror! But somehow my sad ass got more traction, more thumbs, more readership on a game that has a far more limited audience (and is only one game versus 2) than his award-winning article on co-ops, which is a hot-button subject of late.

So, I say that the idea that writing these well-thought out pieces is great, and I encourage Mike, QWERTY, and everyone who is lamenting the sad state of writing to do just this, write about older games, write about the academic aspects, the impact on the industry...all that jazz. I'm also saying that nobody really wants to read that shit. I wish them well, honestly and sincerely, but it's not going to fly unless it's Mike doing it, or Frank, really. Guys who know their shit, are credible, and have something to say.

And I'm REALLY saying that I am sick of whiny ass bitches who aren't contributing a god damned thing to anything or anyone to put up or shut up. If you want good writing, then write. It's not hard. If I can do it, anyone, and I do mean ANYONE can do it. I'm a fucking salesman. There's scientists, academics, analysts...all them are far more qualified to write impact articles with great analysis. So do it. But stop the bitching. Put up or shut up.

Sag, Mike, and Jesse are the only three that get a pass because they HAVE done just that. Everyone else who is whining, shut the fuck up and do something about it.

/end gauntlet toss.

Whatever, Pete. I've written a bunch of stuff on my blog recently, and maybe one post consists of what you'd call 'whining'. Not that I think thumb count is of any significance, but my review of Kingdom Builder (issued May 31st) has 140.

And while you may dismiss the Voice of Experience contest (though you did try to enter it!), it's a little harsh to say I'm just whining and not doing anything. I put days into that.

At a venue like BGG "good" content largely goes unread. Reviews get more thumbs if they're long and have lots of pictures. Popularity is rarely an indication of quality.

There's nothing wrong with that, it's just the nature of the venue. It's geared to the hoi polloi, and it's exceptionally rare that a point of central focus develops. When it does it lasts for a few hours tops. It's user base is very fractured.

Alternate venues (such as this one) have different pacing. BGG is more of a Fox News, F:At more of an Atlantic Monthly. Articles on F:At get a chance to sink in a bit before they roll off into oblivion. In my opinion, if you're spending the time to really put deep thought into your article and you really want to ask tough questions, you need to find a venue that will nurture that.

S.

Sag, I totally agree with you about thumb count being largely uncorrelated with quality. I think the BGG blogs have recently brought in a bit more of the focus and in-depth discussion you describe though.

They did, and I got John Poniske on a blog quickly when they appeared to give him a venue to promote Lincoln's War. Entries were staying on the front page for an entire day. But blogs are becoming as cluttered as all the other sections of the site and I don't think it will be long before they're rolling off the front page in ten minutes.

BGG really needs a featured daily article. I'm not sure it pays them (as in dollars and cents) to do that, so I'm not optimistic it will ever happen. The alternative is to come here.

This sounds like a tangent to the core message of this article but it really isn't. What's the incentive to write complex, well-considered and thought-provoking content when the vast majority of the potential audience can't even find it? Thumb count is a race to the bottom and there's no other indication of quality available on our primary (virtually only) information channel. There's very little incentive to write deep analysis short of the sound of your own pencil scratching.

S.

Ugh.

QWERTY, until LSDSBomber wrote an article about T&E, I had no idea who the fuck you even were. So, this is not about you. And you apparently have your head too far in 9's balls to see that I was COMPLIMENTING you for being a standup guy and doing the VOE thing, although it ultimately proved quite fruitless. I said, "QWERTY is on that shit" meaning "HE IS WALKING THE WALK".

This is a F:AT conversation, about people who complain about the lack of quality in-depth reviews but do absolutely dick to change it. That's facet #1 of my argument.

Facet #2 is that there IS ~ IS ~ IS a place for deeper exploration of gaming, real critical writing, but it's NOT in reviews of individual games.

Facet #3 is that while there IS ~ IS ~ IS a place for the aforementioned exploration, very few are actually going to read it.

And I agree that thumbs have got NOTHING to do with quality. That's my POINT! Thumbs are about READERSHIP. And a review that sucks getting 44 thumbs over a truly nice one with great insight about a subject gets 41 thumbs....it validates my point that by and large, people want to be TOLD WHAT TO BUY in a review more than hear about the growth of games as a medium or whatever high-minded subject you want to write about IN A REVIEW. This applies ONLY TO REVIEWS, but I am sure that the market for these elite articles simply don't have that large an audience.

You guys are having a hell of a time seeing what I'm saying, especially you, QWERTY. I'm not admonishing anyone but those who BITCH AND DO NOTHING. I started my blog because reading people's reviews was a grating exerice. I didn't complain about how bad the writing was; how boring to read, how passionless the articles were. I fucking did my thing. I wrote articles that were fun to read, interesting, and had a STRONG OPINION. And I stand behind my opinions. So, I reiterate, for those of you who bitch, do something.

Mike, Sag, Qwerty, and a few others have DONE SOMEHTING. And it did something, it caused this conversation, and one at BGG. But ultimately, there are very few participants, and only the very, very hardcore will have interest in them.

Let's get back to what's important... Andy's dad is awesome!

Pete, I don't write reviews simply because I don't think I'm qualified as a credible reviewer. I don't have the breadth or depth of experience with many game styles to feel like I can give an expert opinion on the quality of a game. Plus, I honestly don't really get to game that much. If I conformed to your standard of playing a game at least 3 times before reviewing it, it would take me months to review anything after I got it. I really only get to play my favorite types of games once every two weeks. Everything else is party games and light fillers.

I don't think that disqualifies me from having an opinion about the state of game reviews. Frankly, I don't have a real problem with where game reviews are today. Sure, there's lot's of crap out there, but I can usually find what I want, and if not, I can start a thread on F:AT and ask about a game I'm curious about. Also, I understand the distinction between a 'review' and an 'analysis'. A 'review' is focused on giving the reader info about whether they should buy a game, just as you said. I have no problem with that. That's exactly what I'm looking for when I read a review. My point was that I expect a credible reviewer to have broad perspective and experience. I think there are aspects of both Euros and Ameritrash that make a game fun, and I want my reviewers to appreciate that. Someone who dismisses a Euro out of hand because it's a soulless cube-pusher is useless to me. That's why I appreciated it when Barnes was reviewing, praising, and then defending some of the Euros he had been looking at recently. It shows maturity as a game reviewer. (sorry if that sounds like I'm jerking him off. Would it help if I compliment your "required reading" article?)

There is a dearth of quality game analysis, however, and I don't think it's unreasonable for people to bring it up. It's not going to appeal to the masses, but does analysis in any medium appeal to the masses? Analysis is for the one percent of gamers who give a shit. Why don't I write some analysis? Because I don't have the expertise, and I expect more out of a credible analysis than I can give. I don't write it because I don't know it. That's why I want someone to write it.

Michael
the part about games should be able to create interesting questions about the nature of war and death is just, well, bollocks. If games were the medium for this, then there would already be many games that give rise to this. There arent any, its the wrong medium, its like telling Pete off because he says that books cant describe how great music is. He's right. You can't. You need to hear it. Period. Games are not the medium for us to be sat round reflecting on metaphysical philosophy and I think you know it. No one would want to play it, no one would care. Immersion into the subject matter of a game is the best it gets, but you're having a laugh if you think games can, will, or should aspire to any great art. Even something like Twilight Struggle, one of the most immersive theme rich games I've ever played, I haven't for a single second thought about what it means about the duality of the idealism of the communist political system against the practicalities of governments running such schemes, nor about the terrible consequences of what a thermo nuclear war would be. And I think it's completely nonsensical that we should think that this is what games are for, or about. They're just not.

Well thank you, I'll be sure to mention it when I see him in a couple of weeks.

Did you know he met the Queen once? He's a pretty good gardener too.....

I thought the VOE contest produced a shockingly high percentage of good articles. Fuck the thumbs, they were good articles regardless. I was really surprised by the quality; I hope people here have read some of them.

As for "shit or get off the pot": like clockwirk, I honestly feel barely qualified to write reviews. My writing skills started sliding downhill the moment I made the decision to become a math major instead of a literature major, and they haven't stopped sliding. You're right that the answer is to just start writing. In any case, though, nobody has to *produce* the thing they want to *consume*. You bitch about bad games sometimes in your reviews: are you not allowed to do that until you design an awesome game yourself?

Lastly: was I bitching about reviews in this thread? Mainly I was pointing out places & comments where this kind of thinking WAS being done. The only thing I bitched about was your shitty negative attitude.

Please excuse me for assuming that the post in which you name-checked me three times was about me, and for not realising that you were complimenting my contest when you said "the whole thing is bullshit". I'm glad that some, like Dragonstout above, did not see it as fruitless.

I just read the comments in the thread connected to qwerty's blogpost, though, and it's really disappointing how many people willfully misconstrued Barnes to be saying "only 'dumb fun' style games are fun". Really? REALLY? It's kind of unbelievable to me that that's what some people got out of the article.

To be fair (to the commenters), Michael's article really does say that, although probably unintentionally. He starts with trying to be even-handed about the definition of fun, but falls back to his own definition midway (around the part where he gives in to his instinct to have a dig at Princes of Florence). And even if the article's main point is not this, of course it will catch most people's attention. "A man can spend his life building bridges. Do they call him John the Bridge Builder? No. A man can spend his life raising crops. Do they call him John the Farmer? No. But you fuck one goat..."

I'd also like to support Martin here, I think we need to hear and see a lot more of Martin to be honest, he's certainly not in the small group I think are getting a bit caught up in their own celebrity expert status, and I've found his input and output to be interesting, smart and relevant. Just wanted it to be clear that I think there's plenty of room for more in depth, more carefully written and more detailed writing about games, I just think there's a limit to what the medium is designed for, and I think it seems like some people get a bit too caught up in "the power of board game analysis". There really aren't that many games WORTHY of detailed study, and nobody in their right mind wants games to be trying to teach them about the nature of humanity,. Please, I can't wait to end the game on DEFCON 1 in Twilight Struggle, I might pause for thought in real life :) Also, I don't understand why someone like Jesse Dean is harping on about his groundbreaking essay on AFAoS, because "no one was talking about it". Huh? There were literally hundreds of posts about it, I think everyone knew about it, even people who didn't have the game. Who cares, some people still enjoy the game, those who saw it was broken went on a crusade about it (Tim for one). Now we're in with this cult of the "not new" and already we're seeing "in depth" critiques of Ground Floopr which is not even fucking released yet. Please. Let's spend our time looking at games that have lasted OVER TIME, no one is so smart that 10 plays of a game, released or prototype is enough to produce anything more than a bit of self aggrandising bit of hot air sprinkled with some key phrases that sound "smart". Let's find games that are 5, 10, 20, 50 years old and you will probably find they are the ones spending a bit of time and effort unravelling the onion over. No one will be talking about The Manhattan Project, Ora & Labora, Ground Floor or any of the other stuff thats coming out these days in 25 years time, that's pretty much for sure.

anyway, like Pete says, who cares really, a "voice" in boardgames is still a nerd talking about boardgames (no offence, I spend way too much time with it and don't even produce anything at the level of any of the guys mentioned here, including Jesse), lets not get carried away. They are about "fun", but fun is an open ended concept and subjective, which is why any useful writing that leverages "fun" as a quantity needs to be explicitly tied into WHO the person talking is. If Pete thinks something is fun, and Clearclaw thinks something is fun, thats two different kinds of fun, know which one is your kind of fun, and then the use of "fun" is very relevant, you just need to have a reference frame for it. Is digging into the mechanics of a game the bottom line of critical analysis, to me that smacks of pretending something is more accomplished than it is. Are we talking about the emotions and experience generated by how the game plays. I don't know. It doesnt feel like anyone knows, there seems to be as much hot air trying to decide what is good and what isn't than actual articles, which I think is what Pete means, just write stuff and stop trying to make out that its some kind of nobel laureate material. I even said this in the VoE contest. I would laugh my head off at someone who'd played Chess 10 times as a voice of anything but a nitwit. Thats how I felt about T&E and still do, getting close to 100 plays now with online and still feel like i am far from getting it, like there's something fundamentally good about that game thats worth analysis (and I'm afraid mine failed at being anything but a desperate plea to make other people like it!)

Anyway, Martin is one of my favourite contributors, so in summary, more Martin please. Less hand wringing pseduo intellectualism in general.

I don't think anyone suggests that there should be in-depth, "academic" analysis about every single game, or at all. It doesn't mean though that there shouldn't be anything like that at all, and I think Pete underestimates the potential demand for them, even on BGG: after all, the majority of people there are spending good amount of their lives with playing games, reading about games, discussing games, reading rulebooks for fun, and so on.

I also cannot recall reading any review that concentrates solely on the mechanics, and declares a game good or bad based on them, without considering the gaming experience. That's why I have a hard time figuring out what Michael is actually trying to say in his article.

To be exact:

The kind of reviews I hate: the proverbial "rules summary + I like/I dislike". But I don't think there is real demand for them, they are just the easiest to produce (even a well trained monkey could do it), so there's a lot of them in BGG's review sections, and it gives people the impression that this is what a review is supposed to be. Maybe BGG could do something about it, after all, they evaluate the submitted reviews before publishing them, so they could decide to refuse these glorified rules summaries. The only problem is that if they did it, there would be hardly any review at all for most games. It would be beneficial in the long term, however.

The kind of reviews I tolerate, sometimes even enjoy: those, that are all about the subjective experience of the reviewer, without any justification of the verdict, other than "because I said so". These can be fun to read, provided that they are written in a fun style. They are not any more useful, than those of the previous category.

The kind of reviews I love, and would like to see more: those that look at the mechanics (without reiterating them mindlessly), identify whether or not they are anything new (or, at least, are used in a unique combination; or, if not, at least the theme/setting makes it somehow better or worse than another game with the exact same mechanics), and tell me about how these mechanics and theme/setting succeed or fail creating a gaming experience that may or may not be worth the try. If they also throw in some dick jokes, the better.

By the way I didn't mean to sound like I was dissing Jesse, I think it came across that way. Agree with your points wice, absolutely

Lee, you really did sound like you were coming across that way.

I do think there is a point in doing in-depth review of newer games though, if only because it is valuable to let people know if a game plays as well after ten or so plays as it will the first couple. No it is not the same as looking at a game after a hundred plays and saying this is a good game or a bad game, but I think it is a nice compromise between the "one and done" style we see so frequently now and a complete lack of information that could come about from people not reviewing anything unless it is an important game that will last the ages and you have played a hundred times. Yes, it might end up being "wasted effort" as these games will not be played ten years from now, but honestly I have no clue what games are going to be played ten years from now and I am not arrogant enough to assume that I have any special predictive ability to determine otherwise. I have simply established a particular style of games that I am going to focus on reviewing (bigger and more complex games) and I am going to review it regardless of how the game might eventually stand the test of time.

Also, Lee, where the fuck have you seen me harping about my "groundbreaking" essay? I think I have tried to be very clear that what I wrote about was built entirely on things I have seen elsewhere, particularly from Mike and Thrower. Other people may have said things along those lines, and I do not bother to correct them every single time (even if I see it), but I think I have been quite clear in acknowledging those who have done excellent work on this before.

EXACTLY what I am saying. That, and...

My biggest problem with all this is a lot of this detailed analysis writing is still about games that are a year old. Not long ago everyone was saying how Vanuatu was really a whole new great game but I dont remember the last time I heard anyone mention it. It's hard not to think that there's still an undercurrent of wanting to be the first one to waffle on about a game in detail even if its not had 1% of the time in the market to justify it, and where 10 or 15 plays, well, how good can the game be if you've "cracked it" based on that. Come back and tell me when you've played something regularly for 5 years, or 100+ times across all range of player counts and groups and then it might be worth listening to, otherwise, to be honest, it sometimes comes across as "buzzword bingo" and trying to appear to be a professor of boardgames (and not really stopping to think what that means, really).

Let's hear more from people who've really played a game, its obviously been "fun" for them whatever that might entail

Detailed analysis of strategic depth might be difficult for a new game, but analysis of "fun factor" like that done above for Talisman or like that guy with the Thing avatar did in Qwertymartin's thread for King of Tokyo, those have nothing to do with how many times you've played it.

I would never review anything if I waited until I had played it for five years. Publishers would be very put out with me.

But then, my critical analysis of the game ends after I figure out what I like about it.

Lee, two points here in this bit of thread necro...

1) As far as subject matter goes, there was a time when comic books, video games, and movies were considered to be mediums where either no one wanted heavier subject matter or that the mediums couldn't support it. My, how that's changed. Tabletop games could go through that kind of transformation...or they could stay stuck with juvenile pulp subject matter. I like that stuff too, but I believe in the strength of the medium to support more.

2) The comment about "come back in five years" is nonsense. If you've got the wherewithal and ability to review, analyze, and write about games you don't need five years to figure out whether you like it or not and what's worth playing or not worth playing. And frankly, most of the games published don't need to be played more than FIVE TIMES, let alone over five years, to completely parse and evaluate. Get with the modern design sense- there really are very few games that are designed to be played 100+ times and still offer something new. Now, if you're reviewing Star Fleet Battles or ASL, yeah, maybe you need that kind of time...but to think that any of the recent games need five years to "mature" or whatever is a load of crap.

It is pretty funny that people thought that the article was stating that "dumb fun" games were the only games worth playing or whatever. I went out of my way to show that wasn't the case. But then again, how many people really read this stuff completely.

I said I'd leave it alone, but I can't.

First, change your personal text from "Doesn't Contribute" to "Nobody Reads This Shit". This is kind of what I mean, Mike. The great unwashed masses clamor for "more pouridge, sir" yet when they get it, the first thing they do is nitpick it without actually reading or comprehending what you wrote. Like my T-shirt says, "I can explain it to you, but I can't understand it for you." Let he who has eyes, see, I guess.

Second, Matt wasn't saying he'd come back in five years. He was being sarcastic (him? really?) and I think you get that, but maybe not. He's saying that only the cuntiest of cunts would require 5 years of playing anything but the most complex game to be able to speak intelligently about its nuances. Chess, maybe. But Belfort? Really? I mean, even the whole "A Few Acres of Snow" kerfuffle (thanks QP for the word) was in under a year, I believe.

Games are simply not that deep or complex to require any more than a maximum of ten plays to fully understand and be able to clearly articulate. And the idea that somehow "time" is the arbiter of stupidity or brilliance is total bunk. I mean, not to slap around anyone, but I see these "6 months later" threads, and they don't mean dick. If it was "after 10 plays" I'd be more inclined to be interested. I think what those "time" threads are really good for is a gauge of how often a game is played in the timeframe, which really isn't a gauge of quality because we all know that even with us enlightened Ameritrashers, new is new, and people many times will play new before good.

Anyhow, that's all I have. Short version: Keep on writing, but I really don't think people, by the bushel, are reading it, and the drivel in the QWERTYIOUP thread indicates to me that even the self-proclaimed elites (NOT TALKING ABOUT YOU, MARTIN!!!!) who responded over there simply skim, then respond half-cocked.

What I got out of the whole article was:
- Fun-First Design means "Shitty designs that somehow allow the player to look past its faults due to the enjoyability in the product"
- Writers talking about "fun" have a responsibility to explain in objective terms what caused them to believe the game was fun.

And that's the meat. Is that what you were shooting for?