The Firm

To the Editor: I’d say my previous reply was rushed. For one, I am sure I’m subconsciously affected by advertising, that being one of its main benefits in TV and magazines. And perhaps it was sensationalist, and sounded unreasonable. Nevertheless, there is a good reason why the advertising seemed so annoying, and that is the lack of context sensitivity.

The Wall Street Journal is read by many thousands of people, and costs next to nothing, and so a wide range of adverts are appropriate. A physically published gaming magazine might be read by one thousand, and the price ensures only gamers will be affected to any degree, and so gaming adverts are the most sensible choice.

The Escapist is read by relatively few, and the target audience are those who enjoy games without the constant market pressure of the mainstream. Is it really fair then to expose these gaming recluse to the exact corporate standard which may alienate them from Official Playstation Magazine, or any EA game sporting those oh-so-long string of adverts at startup?

I’d also just like to re-iterate that, despite what Andy from last week may think, advertising does not a good magazine make. In fact, a picture of a pint of beer will likely not affect the content of the article it is shoehorned into in any tangable way. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a sudden craving for a Carlsberg.

-Doug Inman

To the Editor: I agree with almost all of John Tynes’ article, “Feature Creep.” However, it’s a shame that John Tynes rejects the Revolution out of hand because of its controller because it will be exactly what he is looking for. Nintendo has shown time and time again that it will make fun games with an easy learning curve.

-Jeff Liu

To the Editor: I’m stunned about the game Chief Economist mentioned in The Escapist 13 (“Capitalism is teh suxx0r!!111!“), but I’m unable to find the game on the net.

This made me realize an issue in The Escapist: most of the time there are no “related links” to the topics you’re talking about (ie: there’s no link to Introversion‘s website or the Uplink website in the uplink article).

I, as being a lazy ass, thus request the following:

a) A link to the Chief Economist website, as I’m unable to find it.

b) A small section for each article containing relevant links (ie: link to the game homepage at least)

Huge thanks in advance.

-Florian Hufsky

To the Editor: Today was my second time reading an article from The Escapist (linked from Shacknews.com) and I again I found it very enjoyable. The Escapist provides a mature and thought provoking commentary on gaming that I find lacking from other publications. Particularly the articles on MMOG economies and feature creep have been very good reads. I look forward to reading more in the future.

-Ryan

To the Editor: In regards to SMAC (and gaming in general) I’m reminded of the malleable triusm, “Simple minds think of people, average minds think of events, great minds think of ideas.” Never before in a game has there been such a confluence of Great Ideas – technological and spiritual determinism, the Will to Power, near-pornographic fetishism of Progress; the list goes on and on. When a game erupts onto the scene with the authority of (at least) a century of concepts behind it, it can’t fail to enthrall the true science fiction dork.

That gaming opens us to the full spectrum of human expression is to be applauded. Unfortunately the simple interactions seem to be crowding out the great ones.

Thanks for the article and the magazine in general. Looking forward to more,

-Ben Warr