The Escapist Re-Visited

In response to “Anomalous Materials” from The Escapist Forum: Bravo. Great article! I never really thought about Half Life not being a treatise against technology, but looking back, you really have to appreciate the story’s restraint. It never goes into any Blade Runner style commentary about the evils of technology, but when it does get on its soapbox, it preaches about the evils of men (oppression, violence, betrayal, etc.)

– m_jim

*Snort* Ah, Gordon, bless you for your simple introductions into scinence and math:

If Z equals amount of zombies, B equals amount of blows required to kill each zombie, then what value would the sum, G, be?

Answer: Gore.

Seriously, though, It’s always nice to play a game and actually learn something, or at the very least not have the ‘You must belieeeeeeve’ message crammed down my throat like taking tea with a Texan Evangelical Minister. Granted, taking steps forward in complexity and relation to real-life concepts is fun and challenging,but we have to be careful not to leave the market behind – I sincerely doubt many people would be too interested if they have to start considering the molecular compounds of their Greater Healing Potion whenever they play their RPG.

Complexiy is fun, and innovation is the lifeblood of gaming, I just hope Valve and the rest of the market remembers that too much too fast isn’t a good thing. After all, most gamers are clearly ‘tarded as stoned chimps. We like shiny colours.
*Is distracted by a passing bee*

– Surggical_Scar

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In response to “What Happened to the Last Starfighters?” from The Escapist Forum: I think the other important aspect in revitalizing the appeal of star fighters is cross-pollination of the sci-fi theme into sister genres (and particularly Adventure/RPGs) with games like Mass Effect. Sci-fi draws more heavily upon the human imagination that almost any other genre; in the same way that space is more boundless than earth, the possibilities of the future are more boundless as compared to things that are happening now or have happened in the past. But for many people, imagination takes a little while to “revv up”, to really get going. Couple that with the gameplay difficulties of an unknown/forgotten genre, and for many, the barrier is set too high. With the demise of the Star Trek series, most people’s imagination is no longer in that sci-fi state. That loss can be recouped, however, with more epic sci-fi based stories told via the popular game genres of today. Mass Effect was one game that really re-kindled that fire under my sci-fi passion: it was epic, it was galactic, it was gadgety and cool, it was Star Wars reborn in every way. If games like that came along a little more often than once in 10 years, perhaps people would be more likely to give a classic star fighter style game a try.

– vaga_koleso

Personally I think Space sims could learn a little from games like Ace Combat control wise (Sacrilege! right:)). I loved playing Wing Commander with my Joystick setup and I thought Ace Combat on my 360 was really good till I tried my brothers out with his joystick setup (he splurged on the special edition). WOW, made me remember how sims are really supposed to be played. I did still enjoy the game without the flight stick but a game like Ace Combat is Great with or without a Joystick. Decent setup on a controller made it accessible. I think they need to dumb down the controls but leave in the option to use more advanced controls if the user wants to.

Oh and I hated with a passion trying to play freespace and Wing Commander with a keyboard and mouse. Thats what made me splurge on a Joystick setup for my computer in the first place.

– logos424

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In response to “Adjacent Data” from The Escapist Forum: A very nice essay, but I wish the world it reflected was the one we were living in. It seems to me that science-fiction is a genre in trouble; perhaps not as much in TV and movies but definitely in books and games. Fantasy seems to be overwhelming sci-fi in those two venues.

I wonder how much ties in with the sentiments expressed in one of the comments to the “My Own Private Outer Space” article. On a personal level, science doesn’t seem very interesting to most people these days. I was 9 when we first walked on the moon, and the space craze gripped myself and my friends like nothing since. It didn’t matter that WE weren’t going to be astronauts. Just the fact that a deed was being done was exciting. And reading science fiction just felt like peering into the future back then.

These days, sometimes reading science fiction just reminds me of how badly we’ve lost our way. It tends to promise a future that we’ll never actually reach at the pace we’re keeping currently. And people are so unconcerned with what progress we do make. The sentiment seems to be “It doesn’t impact me directly, so it isn’t of any interest.” I find it all rather sad.

– pasmith