Games: January 2004 Archive Page

Trolling is like playing chess - there is a point to the game, and that point is to win. Unlike chess, though, there are various ways of winning for the internet troll. These might include:

• gaining credence for false and invidious ideas
• driving bona fide list members, and/or particular groups, out of the mailing list
• dominating the list with messages/posts that they have generated
• gaining recognition or an award for their trolling from fellow trollers
• getting reprimanded by individuals, list managers or internet authorities
• gaining the confidence, trust and support of bona fide list members
• distracting list members from their own bona fide discussions or objectives.

• gaining attention that they cannot get using their real personalities
  

Sometimes trolls operate alone, and sometimes they operate in groups,
but for all of them trolling is a game.
--Beware the Troll (Team Technology)

One of my first experiences with Usenet involved being baited by a troll. I had just written a paper on some subject that was being discussed on a group, and I posted a general inquiry asking whether it would be appropriate to post a paper of X length on the site. I was probably too timid about mentioning the length, because a troll replied with, "sure," and then promptly attacked me for posting "lengthy bullshit." I was very new to newsgroup culture, and it was years before I realized I had been trolled.

=============================================================
 __      __  ___     _______         ___      
|  |    |  |/  /    |   ____|       /   \     
|  |    |  '  /     |  |__         /  ^  \    
|  |    |    <      |   __|       /  /_\  \   
|  |    |  .  \     |  |____     /  _____  \  
|__|    |__|\__\    |_______|   /__/     \__\ 
                                              
=============================================================
IKEA WALKTHROUGH v2.3.1
=============================================================

IKEA is a fully immersive, 3D environmental adventure that allows you to role-play the character of someone who gives a shit about home furnishings. In traversing IKEA, you will experience a meticulously detailed alternate reality filled with garish colors, clear-lacquered birch veneer, and a host of NON-PLAYER CHARACTERS (NPCs) with the glazed looks of the recently anesthetized. --IKEA Walkthrough v2.3.1 (The Morning News)

At the turn of the century a Maryland Quaker, Lizzie Magie, was trying to develop a game that would illustrate the inequities of capitalism and promote a popular "single tax" movement led by Henry George. A century ago this month she received a patent for The Land lord's Game; the illustration in the US Patent Gazette is eerily similar to Monopoly. | The Landlord's Game became a Quaker pastime; over the years little improvements and local details were added by players. Eventually it became known as Monopoly, and a version that used the streets of Atlantic City, New Jersey (still used in the US version of Monopoly) was shown to a man named Charles Darrow in 1931. He sold the rights to Parker Brothers games in 1936. The Quakers' 30-year-old instructive little anti-capitalism game became, in other hands, the opposite. --Tim Dowling --I rolled a two - and got a ghetto stash  (Guardian)

Some background supplied on the history of "Monopoly," as part of the reaction to the export of "Ghettopoly" to Britain.

One of the things on my list of "things I remember from my youth that I wish I could find again" was a science-fiction story in which a group of customs officials (I think) are testing products being imported to Earth. One of the products is a suspicious war toy with little robot soldiers that keep disappearing; but that toy turns out to be a distraction -- the real threat is a board game that teaches children to make business decisions that will result in some offworld faction taking over the economy of the solar system. (The customs officials only glanced at the rules, and didn't notice that you get points for losing your empire.) I found this via Crooked Timber.

Stealthy? 1995? Please. 100% of teenagers play games today (those who don't are a rounding error)--but I doubt the percentage in, say, 1990, during the SNES/Genesis era, was all that different. And the game industry first made the claim that it was bigger than the movies in 1980 or 81, if I remember correctly--albeit revenues then were largely from the arcade cash-drop, not software sales. The point being that games have been hugely important to our culture--particularly youth culture--for two decades or more. If you want to find the point at which sea-change began, you sure don't start with 1995. You can make an argument for 1972 (when both Bushnell's Pong and Ralph Baer's Magnavox Odyssey appeared); 1962 (Steve Rusell's Space War); 1958 (Willy Higginbotham's Tennis for Two, and also Charles Roberts's Tactics); 1913 (H.G. Wells's Little Wars); 1861 (Milton Bradley's The Checkered Game of Life); or 1780 (The King's Game, by Helwig, Master of Pages to the Duke of Brunswick). 1972 is the traditional date, although I'd argue that you can't understand the digital games revolution without understanding the wargaming, miniature, and kriegspiel traditions that predate it--not to mention classic arcade amusements, of course. --Grek Costikyan --The Times on Games (Games * Design * Art * Culture)

Approximately twenty-five years have passed since the production of the first widely-distributed computer games; but the medium still appears malleable and novel, and its criticism remains a new and open field. Much work remains to be done, and many questions have not been asked. What vocabulary will be necessary for a literate engagement with the media of interactive entertainment? What, if any, are the distinctive formal and cultural characteristics of games as distinct from other media? What are, and will be, the standards for critical judgment and interpretation of games? --Form, Culture, and Video Game Criticism | Princeton, March 6, 2004KairosNews/UPenn CFP)

Assuming the SHU powers that be grant my funding request, I'll be attending this conference to present a paper on the history of Will Crowther's original version of what became known as "Colossal Cave Adventure." Crowther's version is presumed to be lost, but I've collected what I can about the version of the game that was found, modified, and re-released by Don Woods.

The paper is part of an article commissioned for the history section of the IF Theorybook, as editor-in-chief Emily Short nicknames it in her e-mails. Maybe Interactive Fiction: History, Craft, and Theory would be a more accurate title. But that would involve a horrid academic colon.

The conference organizes say they don't have a web presence, so I'm just blogging the announcement in KairosNews that prompted me to send in my proposal. The conference is being held by the English Department at Princeton.

In the early days of game publishing, many companies invested great effort not only in the design of their games, but also in the way those games appeared on store shelves and what was included in the box. This article's intention is to describe this lost art of innovative game packaging from the early to mid-1980's, when there seemed to be an abundance of real thought and care behind the customer's experience beyond the software itself. --Bill Loguidice --Game Packaging - A Look to the Past When Treasures Beyond the Game Were Within the Box (Armchair Arcade)

I'm procrastinating a bit after a morning of productive work, so I haven't had time to look through the whole issue. I personally find artificially-paginated articles very hard to read online. Yes, it makes sense to break up a longer article, but I'd prefer the option to see a whole article in a single file (for printing or in-browser full-text searches). I love the site's use of an old, beat-up videogame box as its design theme.

(Update, 17 Jan: Bill told me how to get a printable version. I've changed the URL.)

By the way, a group of interactive fiction enthusiasts has created Feelies.org, where current authors of games typically shared in electronic-only form can produce and sell feelies. From the home page: "We already have posters, pamphlets, coins, maps and CDs from some of the best games of the post-Infocom era."

You find yourself in yon dungeon. Back yonder there is a FLASK. Obvious exits are NORTH, SOUTH, and DENNIS.

What wouldst thou deau?
>_ --Strong Bad: Video Games (Homestarrunner.com)

Bobby actually e-mailed me this suggestion a few days ago, and I saw it in a comment on MGK, and on the rec.arts.int-fiction newsgroup, but this was the first week of classes, and I only had the chance to view it just now. At the end, you can actually play the different spoof games.

If you aren't familiar with the Strong Bad character, here's another of my favorites: "A Well Thought-Out English Paper"

One of the great gifts of the book is the entrée it affords into the contemporary IF scene. Graham Nelson, Adam Cadre, Emily Short, and Andrew Plotkin were all authors who were new to me, but no sooner had I worked through Plotkin’s remarkable “Shade” than I added it to my spring syllabus (which I’ll post soon, btw); and I suspect others will follow suit. In fact I wouldn’t be surprised to find this text canonized amongst a new academic audience because of Montfort’s account of it here. --Matt Kirschenbaum reviews Nick Montfort's Twisty Little Passages --Wor(l)d Games (MGK)

As George wrote in a comment to the above entry, "Stuff like this is why I like reading blogs."

I don't know what it is about interactive fiction, but it prompts a lot of autobiographical essays like this one. (See also SPAG newsletter editor Paul O'Brian's review.)

And homestarrunner.com features a text game this week.

I oughta add a new category: geekiness.

--History of Computer Game Design: Technology, Culture, Business (Stanford University)

This course website features an excellent bibliography of computer game history and scholarship.

The game's artificial intelligence borders on idiotic. At one point, I conversed with the civic manager of Upper Seattle in his office. After our chat, he conveniently walked into the hallway and blankly looked on as I hacked into his safe and stole secret information.

I was especially disappointed with Invisible War because its ambitious technological underpinnings held much promise.

Graphics were filled with realistic nuances such as hanging lights which swayed to and fro when I bumped them. Boxes and other objects had real weight and could be picked up and thrown.

But all this technical wizardry was for naught and had no real bearing on gameplay. --Matt Slagle --PC version of Deus Ex: Invisible War disappoints (AP/USA Today)

I had been looking forward to this game -- the original Deus X was fantastic: a first-person shooter/role-playing/adventure hybrid with fully voiced dialogue and multiple solutions to every problem. Looks like the designers put too much energy into the technology, and not enough into the storyline. I'll read a few more reviews before I make up my mind, but I can tell right now I'm not buying this title for full price.