Iam NotRegret wrote:Thanks for your article: Arcade culture
Your article made me re-think arcade games and now I can enjoy them much more than before.
When I was growing up my favorite arcade game was Sonic Wings. I would go to the machine whenever I had money and shove in quarters. I had no concept of 1ccing games so like most people in the united states I quarter fed. Often I would just end up killing bosses due to bomb spam. It was still fucking fun though even though I would quarter feed and get to the hard levels where I had absolutely no chance for surviving for more than a few seconds. One day I came to the arcade with more quarters than normal and managed to buy my way all the way to the final stage. When I died in there and put in a new credit rather than re spawning right where I left off the game sent me back to the start of the level. It was absolutely frightening, when it happened a second time I knew it wasn't a bug. This level couldn't be beaten by quarter feeding. I fed a few more credits realizing now that I needed actually dodge all the enemy fire and save my bombs for an upcoming boss. I got my ass kicked and left the machine knowing there was no way I could get through it.
I never thought the game was impossible. The concept of survival was simple enough. Position your ship so you don't get hit by bullets. The very idea of going through an entire stage on 1 life (let alone something as hard as the final stage) seemed beyond what a human could do. I asked an older player (guy in his early 20s) about the game. "How do you get through the last stage if you restart after dying?" He just gave me a stupid look. He might given me an obvious like "don't get hit" I don't remember. That was one of the most crushing moments I had as a gamer. I went to the arcade a lot less after that and didn't play sonic wings anymore.
Fast forward a few years and emulator technology has gotten better. I now have access to all the arcade games I want, unlimited credits, for free. I played around with that for a few days but it seemed to lack the joy I had in the arcade. I would go through a game with infinite credits, beat it than be bored and never start again. On the other hand when I had my emulators for nes and snes I loved them. I spent countless hours playing contra, gradius, mega-man, ninja gaiden. All games with the arcade spirit. I didn't use save states either played them all correctly and loved the experience. I guess I knew not to use save states because I had grown with the original consoles. Save stating was a new concept and it was pretty cool to fool around with it and abuse it but after doing that for a few days it could got boring. The games were much less fun with save states so I quickly learned to never use them. I was more clueless about how to play an arcade game so it never occurred to me to limit my continues when emulating them.
I never gave arcade games much thought after that. There was old games on emulators and new games on consoles. No one I knew talked about arcade games and most of my old hang-outs had deteriorated. I remember going back to my old hang-out and seeing Sonic wings was replaced with some shitty sports game.
Fast forward again and I found your website by accident on google. Arcade culture stuck out to me as an article. I had never really seen an intelligent article on the subject. The idea of 1ccing an arcade game, even an easy one seemed insurmountably hard. I've always liked challenge and I felt pretty confident as a gamer. I had beaten numerous NES games so maybe I can handle the arcade now. I went back to my old mame emulator. I tried 1ccing various games, shmups, platformers, beat em ups. My first impression with limiting myself to only one credit was that I needed to completely re-think how I would played the game. I couldn't bomb-spam anymore in shmups and every little jab an enemy did on me in a beat em up had consequences. The games were more intense and there were elements of strategy. I needed to fight for every life, every chunk of health. It was a lot more engaging than before but also a wake up call for how weak I was as a gamer.
Initially I set myself up with 3 credits to a game (the same number of continues contra and other console games give you) than I lowered myself down to 2 than 1. I noticed that my 2nd and 3rd credits didn't actually do much. First credit would take me to about the limit of where my skills matched the enemy and going any further than that made the game less enjoyable and not take me very far anyway. I was really impressed how in (the well designed) arcade games 1 credit seemed to be the perfect amount of lives/health.
At this time I didn't really have an urge to credit feed on emulation. Watching the game over timer count from 10-0 sometimes I did throw in some extra credits from time to time although those wern't very exciting. I wanted to go back to the early stages and do them right. Eventually the game over time became a curtain-fall. I would watch the timer go down and reflect on what I learned that run, sometimes feeling satisfied when I had reached a particular stage. Sometimes I would even put my initials in the high score even though MAME would wipe the highscore emulator after I closed the game.
I jumped around from game to game and eventually realized that I would need to pick 1 and stick with it if I ever wanted to 1cc anything.
Eventually I decided that out-zone would be the game I 1cc. It wasn't the easiest arcade game but it had a catchy soundtrack which made me want to keep retrying. The game also told you the % complete you did of the game which was such a huge insensitive to improve myself. It was a long journey that took months and hundreds of attempts. The transformation from losing a life at the first screen in the game, being clueless to the enemy ai, dying from the games time limit and being terrible at piloting the game's avatar to storming through the gates, blitzing through the barricades, blowing up enemies the moment they spawn, complete understanding of every possible an enemy could take and how to counter it, finishing a level with 10 fucking bombs stacked up was indescribably wonderful.
After several months of playing it I finally 1cc'ed it probably one of the best experiences I've had with gaming. Mastering an arcade game is unlike any other experience. Each play through is a rush of adrenaline that never stops till you die or win. I've gotten better and have also 1cc'ed metal slug and the original contra.
On the other hand I want to go back in time and punch my younger self in the face for wasting my opportunity to experience an arcade scene. How much more skilled would I be if I had been playing by the 1cc rule since back than? What was the social scene like in arcades? I'll never know, the arcade scene is dead in the USA.
Emulation is my proxy for having a real arcade scene, its not the true experience but its so much fucking fun and I thank you for showing me how to play arcade games properly. I've gone through more arcade, most of them I can't 1cc but the way of playing with only 1 credit makes them so much fucking fun. I haven't gotten this much entertainment of games since my childhood experiencing contra and gradius for the first time. I'd love to go the japan and see what its like there but with my current situation thats not gonna happen any time soon.
I really want to thank you for showing me this experience. Its really expanded what I can play and brought me so much enjoyment.
Now I'm worried about the future of arcade styled games. Its true what you said. The older generations of games (nes, snes, genesis, etc) were only able to produce amazing games because of their arcade roots. Games have moved away from that. The modern generation of games have a model where you are guaranteed to win as long as you don't uninstall the game: minor or nonexistent penalties for dying, slow passive enemies, entire rooms or even whole chapters devoted to some gimmick, and terribly slow pacing. The entertainment doesn't come from mastering and understanding the game's rules and mechanics anymore.
I grew up with older games on the nes, snes, and sega so I had an understanding of what it arcade styled games where like. The games are fast, brutally difficult, and demanded a lot of from you. Getting a game-over was a natural part of the game. You would die over and over. Often you would never be able to complete the game. You didn't care if you did though. You lived in the moment.
The process of going from playing an NES game to playing an arcade was relatively smooth.
I was already used to having limited continues and lives.
I already knew you had to improve as a player to reach the next stage.
I knew that 99.9% of the time If I got hit by an enemy it was avoidable and means I made a mistake.
I already expected the game to not hold me hand or provide me with easy solutions to the challenges.
I've never been able to convert someone born in the newer generations of games. The idea of playing a game to challenge yourself is too foreign them. The idea of dying to the same scenario more than once makes them want to leave. No shiny achievements or shallow level up system doesn't treat their ego well. I've tried starting them on easy arcade-styled games with detailed polygons (f-zero gx and neo contra back when they were current generation) but as soon as they run into a wall rather than trying to find a solution they stop playing. If they game over twice in a row to the same obstacle they dont want to play even if I try to tell the how to win.
Taking someone used to modern style games and trying to teach them seems hopeless and it makes me worry for the future of gaming.
Maybe theres some hope. Modern arcade styled games like megaman 9 and touhou series have a caught a few gamers attention. Even if they happen to be pretty easy its a step in the right direction.
In conclusion your article Arcade Culture is easily the single most influential piece of gaming literature I have ever read. I've probably learned more about the nature of video games from your articles than all other editorials I've read combined. I feel like I've seen a whole new range of mountains to climb.
I wrote:It's not about playing a game "to challenge yourself". If I want to challenge myself I'll go surfing or read Baudrillard. Videogame challenges are trivial if you don't have some kind of physical or mental handicap. It's simply that, in order to get the maximum enjoyment out of some games, you have to make sure you don't ruin their level of challenge, because this challenge was an integral part of the package when the designers made the game, and if you ruin it you are ruining the package.
The most influential thing I have written on games is my Genealogy, by the way. Arcade Culture was great for 2007, but this is 2013 ;)
Iam NotRegret wrote:There's definitely more meaningful or complex ways to expend energy. Video games are more engaging to me than philosophy or sports. Virtual monsters, death, and battle are much more exciting. You understand all those boring, complicated texts written by dead germans as well as electronic games better than me so I'll take your word on which is superior. ^_^
Personally I've always thought that the approach to making games challenging is the best way to design a game. Games are pretty shitty at being cinematic or having good story-telling. Proper story-pacing is impossible to maintain with constant combat among many other problems. There are games where the enjoyment comes from exploration, atmosphere or discovery but those are very fleeting types of satisfaction. After you explore a metroid or zelda once you already know where everything is so the 2nd or 3rd playthrough is much less enjoyable. Something like a rail-shooter or contra is more long-lasting.
I like most of the Geneology articles a lot of the ideas are importaint for a more global understanding of games as a whole like clarifying what rpgs are (or rather that they dont exist in the electronic form). I think you are overly critical of japanese rpgs though. I'll concede the japanese side of rpgs is horribly bloated. Most of the games are 4-6 times longer than they should be to meet some arbitrary standard about how long the game is. As far as action games with heavy-emphasis on character stats (action rpgs) I think the japanese are better than the western counter-parts. Compare diablo 3 to one of the more recent Ys games for instance.
I didn't understand why most your later writing has such an accusative and angry to tone them. Than again I distance myself from modern gaming culture as much as possible and would probably be pretty spiteful if I had to involve myself in it.
Also if it makes you feel any better you are the only journalist I ever had crush on ^_^
I wrote:You haven't even been able to figure out which article I meant by the "Genealogy"... And all your other ideas about games are retarded... And that makes sense given how physical and mental activity is "boring" to you and the only thing you seem to like is pressing buttons. The "2nd or 3rd" playthrough lol. And you wonder why I am angry. Just do yourself and me a favor and go back to reading IGN, please. The less you talk about my ideas the less you will pervert them.