Games

[icycalm]

http://insomnia.ac/reviews/pdp-1/spacewar/

Images (which I will blend with the text once I find the time):







Videos:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rmvb4Hktv7U
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7bzWnaH-0sg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yxV-HqXLJvA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-o-wB7ULQWk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=59PMs2Q-5jg

Further reading:

http://www.wheels.org/spacewar/
http://www.wheels.org/spacewar/creative ... rigin.html
http://www.wheels.org/spacewar/stone/rolling_stone.html
http://www.wheels.org/spacewar/joystick_nation.html
http://www3.sympatico.ca/maury/games/sp ... cewar.html
http://www.computerhistory.org/pdp-1/in ... e&s=4&ss=3
http://www.kaleberg.com/spacewar/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spacewar!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PDP-1

[Mr. Apol]

I really enjoyed the review. Good work.

[icycalm]

Glad you enjoyed it.

A clarification, since someone emailed me about that.

Spacewar itself also used a vector display system, so depending on your definition of a videogame it might not have been one

A video game is a game that involves interaction with a user interface to generate visual feedback on a video device. The word video in video game traditionally referred to a raster display device.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_game
http://www.freepatentsonline.com/3659285.html

Translation: using the old, strict definition of a video game, stuff like the games running on Vectrex (which used an integrated vector monitor displaying vector graphics, instead of a TV rendering raster graphics) cannot be officially classified as video games (as in a court of law, for example).

But as I mentioned in the review, all this is beside the point.

[mees]

I really liked this review. The quotes were pretty interesting.

But are you planning on discussing the theme at any point? Or is that a job for someone else?

I was most excited for that part, although it quickly became evident that you weren't going to discuss it in detail. :(

[icycalm]

But are you planning on discussing the theme at any point? Or is that a job for someone else?

lol, who else? Go ask Tim Rogers and see if he feels up to it.

It'll be in my book, though to be able to really understand it you must have first read most if not all of the books listed here. It's either that, or be satisfied with the Heraclitus quote.

[icycalm]

I got an email response to this review from that rob guy I recently banned. My reply is hilarious enough that I figured some people might want to read it:

So time to discover what it was that made this game so special, apart from it being the first one -- which as it turns out it might actually not have been, though the specifics of the matter turn on semantics, as such matters tend to do, and as it happens in this case are of little interest.

Oh, well then. It's like you can use a handful of commas and still need about 5 more. Of little interest = worth half of the non-wikipedia portion of the article.

Deeming people stupid while writing stuff like this. Nonsense!

Rob, kid, listen. JUST BECAUSE IT IS OF LITTLE INTEREST DOESN'T MEAN THAT EXPLAINING WHY IT IS OF LITTLE INTEREST IS ALSO OF LITTLE INTEREST.

Not being able to understand the above sentence marks you out as not smart enough to have a conversation with me. Sorry :(

And I am also sorry you are offended by my virtuoso use of commas. I am sorry the world works in such a way that we can't all be good writers. :(

Now will you go back to your retarded friends on Shmups.com and Youtube and leave me the fuck alone?

[bullethell]

Awesome article, Alex. Keep them coming please.

[Bradford]

I also enjoyed the article, but I'd like to comment on its style, rather than substance. Perhaps I'm wrong, but there was something different about this one. It had a particular tone to it that I don't recall from any other articles, and I can't quite put my finger on it. Romantic, wistful; both those words come to mind but neither quite fit. You just seemed to give your statements some dramatic embellishments that very nicely suited the subject. Or maybe it's just me, but that's something that seemed to jump out at me.

Also, if inadequate comma usage is the harshest criticism anyone can come up with, I'd say you're doing alright.

[zinger]

Very exciting. Puts the STG genre in a whole different context!

[mees]

Also, if inadequate comma usage is the harshest criticism anyone can come up with, I'd say you're doing alright.

Hardly the harshest criticism:

http://forums.selectbutton.net/viewtopic.php?t=17487

[icycalm]

There is no criticism in that thread -- the people who post on SB are one and all incapable of it. The one or two exceptions (DeusJester, aderack, et al.) have given up posting there.

The only comments which come close to criticism are the ones about vector graphics, which are based on ignorance as I explained above, and the ones about Star Control, which do have some measure of validity, though the person who posed them had enough sense to answer his own objections (emphasis is mine):

But to totally ignore Star Control - a series that has a strong and devoted following (that has lovingly RECREATED the damn thing several times over) that stayed true to the original mechanics while actually evolving the shooting part, using character variety and special abilities before fighting games ever figured out what those meant, in order to overly praise some (admittedly good and unappreciated) little game is just frickin' annoying. (unless he counts that as "minor revisioning", which would be even more annoying.)

http://forums.selectbutton.net/viewtopi ... 071#441071

I will explain exactly why I view Star Control as "minor revisioning" whenever I get around to reviewing the first game.

[icycalm]

Might as well answer this now:

Star Control [...] used character variety and special abilities before fighting games ever figured out what those meant

http://forums.selectbutton.net/viewtopi ... 071#441071

Star Control indeed used character variety and special abilities, but that is a fact which nothing in my review disputes, as my would-be-critic would realize if he had better reading comprehension skills. What I said in the review is that the concepts of character variety and special abilities were EVOLVED by fighting games, and that is certainly what happened -- fighting games went much, much further with these ideas than Star Control ever did, and it is from the world of fighting games that G.rev took these, by then highly evolved concepts, and reworked them into the vs. shooting design.

I swear to God, one may read SB for weeks and months and not come across three posts that are not completely and utterly worthless.

[icycalm]

Also, this:

I also enjoyed the article, but I'd like to comment on its style, rather than substance. Perhaps I'm wrong, but there was something different about this one. It had a particular tone to it that I don't recall from any other articles, and I can't quite put my finger on it. Romantic, wistful; both those words come to mind but neither quite fit. You just seemed to give your statements some dramatic embellishments that very nicely suited the subject. Or maybe it's just me, but that's something that seemed to jump out at me.

It should be plain that this review is very different in tone from all the others, but then this game is very different from all the others. The tone is not something I consciously strived for: the thoughts this game engendered in my mind were of a kind compelling me to express them in this manner. Which is how it should be: tone and style should not be arbitrarily chosen -- they must be determined by the subject matter.

At bottom is the difference between reviewing an original game, and a mere update. You will see much better what I mean if you read the next couple of reviews I am writing (all of which deal with original games), and an upcoming article which explains that what in real-life we call "games", in the electronic world we call "genres". When you review a genre, then, i.e. an original game, you must necessarily take larger views (if you are at all capable of taking them, that is) and your thought will of necessity wander into broader ideas, meaning philosophical ones, with the result being the kind of writing you just witnessed. When, on the other hand, you review Street Fighter ver. 2.653432, your writing will necessarily be more pedestrian, since all you have to talk about are minute changes (see, for example, my Windy X Windam review). It is only a mediocre and confused writer who will attempt to seem profound at all times, even when the subject matter does not warrant it, with the result being that he comes off as intolerably pretentious and ridiculous (see Tim Rogers and the New Games Artfags).