The Gamer’s Quagmire #44: The Gaming Motivational Spectrum
Everything you wanted to know about gaming, and less.
by Jamison DeLorenzo
Sometimes all you need is a little motivation. Even when your job is completely draining you and you have no mental energy when you get home to do anything but stare at the wall sometimes some slight motivation is all you need to do something you have been meaning to do for months. Don’t get me wrong, staring at a wall is a lot of fun and soothing and everyone should do it every day. The fact that I have not been in the mood to even look at video games at all in over 3 weeks has been consternation and I have been struggling to understand why. Wrestling with your conscience sucks.Okay, the fact that I have not written anything in 3 weeks because of a severe lack in downtime is also a motivator. In case you were wondering why I felt compelled to release an article in the middle of a week, there’s why.
In all fairness I know exactly what the problem is and have been unwilling to admit it for several months now. Like any addict in need of help it is time to face the problem head on. World of Warcraft has completely drained my willingness to play games. It’s a lot of fun to play, collecting gear, killing stuff- everything an RPG fan wants for online play (outside of a coherent universe). I regret none of the time I have spent playing this game. The problem is that after playing it for close to 2 years I really have to question what I am still logging in for. I’ve got multiple level 70 characters, a couple more in the 60’s, and have been into and through mostly every dungeon. Finding the motivation to play more is quite a struggle.
When I wrote about Gaming Connoisseur Detachment Syndrome and Adventurer’s Perfectionist Disorder I apparently knew more than I realized at the time. APD kept me playing World of Warcraft for such a long time that the tightly wound ball of perfection that kept me playing for so long finally unraveled. I want to keep playing as there are still plenty of different challenges left uncompleted (the APD side of the equation), but caring enough to complete them has not happened. The problem, once again, is motivation. It is comforting to finally know what my own breaking point is for such games.
Misguided or aimless motivation is much worse than no motivation, however. After discussing the intricacies of the gamer points systems for the current generation of gaming consoles there was one question that currently remains unanswered- what do these points really buy you? Can you use achievement points to retrieve prizes or are these points nothing more than a way for gamers to measure their egos? Do 20,000 online points make you a good gamer or does it simply mean you are a mindless points zombie? Granted, it is very comforting to know that Microsoft managed to create a system where people mutually started an arms race for points which has turned into nothing more than an inflated revenue stream for gaming rental outlets.
This point, by the way, needs to be the lynchpin for anyone who wants to write a gaming industry doomsday article. I’m not saying this just because I miss reading these silly articles either. The internet and housing bubbles have burst and there is a pattern to it. I’m not one of those people that looks to blame the worlds’ ills on Microsoft (the unbearable console hard drive is enough for now), but you cannot dismiss the effect gaming points have on rentals.
Incidentally, the virtual king of the mountain is an exciting event to witness. Honestly I am having trouble believing this is anything but a virtual Cuban Missile Crisis game. People are stockpiling points that, as of this point in time, they will never use. It’s not like you can unlock content or download special items if you have an obscene amount of points. I have about 2,000 and I’m already completely disinterested in collecting any more. Granted, there is no impending doom or worst-case scenario of massive fallout or a nuclear winter with online gaming points, but when gamers force themselves to play games of the Fusion Frenzy 2 variant. Note the word choice- this points race is viral and you need to understand that. Anything less than accepting this is… unacceptable.
Is there a challenge out there that is worth chasing? I have fun playing many different games, but when you feel like you are simply biding time until the release of a couple games for the PC can there really be any motivation to play what is currently available? This poses a major motivation threat to online games. You see the ticker on the clock for when you know you will stop playing the game, so is there a real point to running yourself into the ground when, after you leave, you know you aren’t coming back? Sure, online game developers have the great ability to add new levels of content to appease the hardcore player, but there’s only so much you can do to distract a gaming connoisseur before he realizes there are about 30 different games he needs to catch up on.
What the sickening part of the online points system is that I have been looking for ways to lay down may gaming credentials against everyone else. I’ve had a knack for racing games for a long time, and while both Gran Turismo and Gotham City Racing provide good challenges, GTR provides a great online challenge system up to a point. When the toughest challenges in a game boil down to can you keep your car in a skid for 5 minutes you are forced to ask yourself why you would be proud of being the best at driving like a complete moron. This is a challenge I’ve convinced myself that people in Rochester have an ongoing competition for (with the current winner being someone driving around half a mile in reverse on the highway in the middle lane because they missed an exit), but that doesn’t mean I want to enter my name in the running. Believe it or not, not all challenges need to be faced. This lesson is usually learned by the time you inflict massive amounts of damage during a psychotic bicycling or skating stunt or you realize afterwards you really shouldn’t have attempted. With any luck you stopped during the dares to eat certain spoiled foods… something those on Fear Factor never quite figured out.
But I digress. Yes, the game also has the multiplayer race challenges which do provide the exact challenge I’m looking for and I’ve done very well in those, but that challenge is quite old. It is very easy to find challenges in games when you look for them. I really need to ask myself what the happy medium is for me. I’m stuck with no motivation but fear the arms race of achievement points. What do I do?
The most troubling act is that I have locked myself into waiting for Hellgate: London, Spore (which forces me to consider making a one-time exemption to give EA money), and GTA IV. In the meantime I’ve reverted back to playing Sims 2 on the PC and Final Fantasy VI on the GBA. While I will defend those games to the bitter end as 2 of the top 20 all time games I still have games like several games on the bench with unresolved challenges. This includes completing Civilization IV and The Movies on the hardest levels (although I haven’t unlocked everything in The Movies on the lower levels), San Andreas (when the only open mission is gaining favor with a dominatrix to get into a bank vault- the quintessential example of no motivation), Final Fantasy XII (I have no explanation for why I don’t plug this game back in), NBA 2K7 (my franchise hasn’t run long enough to get my player into the Hall of Fame), PGR 3 (I don’t have all of Platinum Medals in the true racing challenges), and Crackdown (collecting all of the orbs can be an infuriating task).
On the plus side every Diablo II challenge was completed several times over, so thankfully there’s no going back to some games. What I have to realize is where that line is for online games much sooner than I already have.
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March 5, 2007
The Gamer’s Quagmire #42: My Guide to the GTA IV Galaxy
Everything you wanted to know about gaming, and less.
by Jamison DeLorenzo
What is going to be one of the biggest games for this year, assuming the launch date is accurate, is going to be Grand Theft Auto IV. No, I do not expect this game to blow me out of the water like Vice City did, but I expect big things. I am sure a lot of other people are too. Considering GTA III has remained in the limelight long after each of its incarnations have been released the impending release of this game is going to be larger than the gaming community (bank on the media playing a controversy angle). In fact, the odds are close to 100% that the lines for the game will be a lot longer just because people outside the gaming community continue to talk about it.
History keeps repeating itself this way. The best advertising is always free, so when people keep mentioning the game Rockstar can just sit back and count the cash coming in. Sure, they have to watch it go out to as their CEO and PR department have not exactly been the best thing for Rockstar. More accurately their PR department plays like a good blooper reel. In my head I see a department run by Krusty the Clown- because not only would it still be funny but it would be expected. Perhaps that is not a practical solution. Regardless, as long as they keep their games right it makes no difference.
Talking about a game this long before its release is dangerous, and so I write this with what is probably too much enthusiasm. I find it impossible to care if I am setting myself up for a big fall on this or not- in my lifetime Vice City is probably my defining game, so it is only natural that the next big leap in the franchise (San Andreas was a minor leap- but still a great one) is something I pay very close attention to. Will this be a good leap or a Pitfall leap?
Yeah, video game humor- you really have to love it.
Details on this game are obviously very sketchy right now. The only interesting rumor that is floating around is the backdrop for the game. Rockstar has been looking to do a GTA game that is outside the U.S. for a good amount of time and this definitely presents an opportunity. The setting has had a dramatic effect on how the game feels and plays with both Vice City and San Andreas. Any good game has this immersive quality about it. As such, the GTA IV setting may not be that pivotal for you it is quite so for me. If I feel like I am moving around in an actual city versus some artificial world it makes a big difference. If you don’t believe immersion is important consider this- could you really live in a world without the Degenatron?
(WARNING: previous joke aimed at GTA fans: if confused consult Wikipedia or, better still, play Vice City)
Looking back at all of the best parts of the GTA III series there are some noteworthy changes in the franchise. Before The Sims 2 came out I made a list of some changes I wanted in the game that would make the game a lot better without making it too complicated. Having a solid background in simulations (both for computer science experimentation and gaming) I came up with mostly everything that the game designers did- and this scared me. No, I am not an expert and I have no insider information. Still, it is always fun to guess. While I do not consider this guesswork I put together a small list of ideas that I want to see in the series. This was tough to put together mostly because the standard upgrades that games get I wanted to avoid just because they are not innovative anymore (the most obvious being more guns and vehicles).
1) We need better ways avoiding wanted level capture. I have never been a big fan of driving over the bribe icons, but if you are going to have rampages, health, armor, guns, and hidden packages then those are not a bad idea. It would paint a very interesting picture if bribing was different based on your wanted level. For instance, the bribe icons only work with local and state police. Once the FBI and army come in then you should have to do some very impressive tricks to get out of your predicament. Having a secret meeting with corrupt agents and paying a lot of money comes to mind. Oooh, maybe besides money you could even have access to special missions for assassinations when your meter is high enough. That’s just off the top of my head. This is definitely worth exploring.
2) Owning houses and businesses was just about where I would like it in Vice City. The balance was nice. Watching the criminals trying to steal over $20 million from my vault during the final mission was also quite hysterical. Okay, let me explain this one. Given that much money you would have about 6 hours at least to complete a mission that takes 5 minutes if you are tooling around. Overall there was enough variation in big purchases where the overall mass of what you could own was far from obscene (ignoring the adult film studio, mind you). I want to know why there’s no system in place yet for being a real pimp. If you can own a printing press and cab company then what’s stopping this? Building a city-wide ring that really rakes in the cash is far too appealing. You could even to do that in a multiplayer environment. Hmm, this leads me to…
3) Cooperative play. Yeah, everyone’s clamoring for it which makes this cherry-picking. I want more than just multiplayer- I want it to blow people away (at this point you have to know that pun was intended). There was a very small amount of it in San Andreas and it felt like a last-minute add. The multiplayer deathmatch and cannonball experience has been missing from the console games completely. This needs to be remedied now. Online play is far beyond established and we know that the 360 and PS3 can handle it. It is time to tap into some untapped potential.
For cooperative play I don’t want some lame situation where only certain missions are possible to have multiplayer. I want you to be able to “hire help” whenever possible. If San Andreas could handle a car doing a 4x drive-by then IV candle hiring a gang buddy for a fee. Hey, the more money you pay the more loaded the friend can be.
For competitive play there can be some great things. Deathmatch is a must, but there also need to be variations. I want a competition on who can do the most damage, who can blow up more civilian or law enforcement vehicles, who can run the most people over, who can do the most drive-bys, and so on. In the cannonball races I want a preset wanted rating, an option where my car blows up if I’m driving too slowly, or even a race between pizza delivery scooters (the equivalent of a slap only deathmatch).
4) I must admit I was against flying when it was brought in even though it led to interacting with James Woods. I was vehemently against swimming not causing death, but you cannot be resistant to change all of the time. It is now time to add something to those who love running around to avoid cops- climbing. The days of only stairs and jumping must pass. Even games like Tony Hawk have a mildly passable system now. If you can jump between planes, skydive, and scuba then we are far beyond ready for the ability to climb buildings. More ways to explore, more places to hide stuff, more ways to annoy cops- these are all good things.
Yes, the upgrade in graphics is going to be quite intense (if you care about such things) and may largely determine whether this game is accepted by the previous fan club. I don’t want the changes in the game to be disingenuous. I want solid innovations in this franchise to continue for a long time. We have a good litmus test coming for whether Rockstar is as good at innovation as I think they are. They proved it with III, Vice, Andreas, and Bully. I believe they can do it again.
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December 11, 2006
The Gamer’s Quagmire #36: The More (Gaming) You Know
Everything you wanted to know about gaming, and less.
by Jamison DeLorenzo
In the time honored tradition of the year-in-review articles that are being tossed around (‘tis the season, etc etc, blah blah, bah hum bug) I began avoiding such articles in a vain attempt to stick with something fresh this week. Lo and behold there was a very fascinating report this year that proved to be one of the most interesting reads of the year. NIMF, or the National Instititute of the Media and Family, has effectively been the Yin to my Yang in that they almost always take the opposite side of the violence and video game coin.When they recently sent out their report about their observations of the gaming industry for 2006 I greeted it with the usual apathy and continued on with playing Final Fantasy (one of the few holiday traditions worth savoring along with sleeping in, drinking egg nog, trying to avoid arguments over dinner, and whining about presents). As you would expect something about the article caught my eye- otherwise why bother writing about it? There were hints of the gaming industry being given good grades and the family being given bad grades.
Did I wake up in some fairy tale dream world? I checked to see if Gran Turismo 4 had online play. I looked for interesting PSP games. I scoured my basement for my SNES Final Fantasy cartridges. Sadly all of these awful aspects of my gaming life hadn’t changed, so maybe one of my biggest complaints about how society looks at video games might actually be changing without requiring me to sign over some more of my organs. I read their report and walked away feeling relatively good about what people see in the gaming industry and what some of the real problems surrounding video games might be.
For me the problem always boils down to education. Idiocy is borne out of ignorance no matter what subject we are talking about. I feel this is especially true with video games because this is a novel concept to most people older than my generation. Even though I played Atari 2600 games with my parents for several years an industry driven purely by technology has greatly surpassed them. I never played a golf video game with my dad before but I have played many a round with him for a long time. The last video game I played with him was Street Fighter II, so imagine the surprise showing him Tiger Woods 2007 for the first time.
Without the willingness to learn more about subjects we lose touch with what is going on the world. This is not meant to blame or accuse, but to make you think about how tough it is for people to look at video games without being scared because of how quickly the industry is changing. We all can’t be experts on everything and that’s okay, but once you start imposing laws based on ignorance, well, you start to annoy me.
And so I write.
The major point I took away from last year’s report was that the video game industry was incredibly irresponsible and needed to make severe changes. In the wake of what was going on with GTA it was marginally understandable why people believed that, but ignorance to this day still makes people blame Rockstar for that catastrophe. I confess that I never did read the entire report from last year, so I cannot speak of how things are different this time around, but what I can tell you is that if parents pay any attention at all to this report then good things are on the horizon.
Even before the report dives into the specifics of what NIMF observed this year they talk about parents being far too ignorant when it comes to what their kids are playing and how often they play. I had rules on video games back in my school days too, even when it came to studying for subjects I was already getting straight A’s in. It seemed unfair then and it seems unfair now, but when you are asked to study your material, especially during the high school years, you should do it.
Finding the proper amount of time to play video game is always tricky. The best example is that you really can’t eat as much as you did in high school 15 years later and still expect to stay in shape, especially when you are no longer playing basketball or tennis 6 days a week. I hardly think video games are the main cause of health issues in America (visit a casino and get back to me) so it’s hard to talk about that aspect of the report. I’ll leave you to your own devices in deciding what to think about health and video games (I won’t condone DDR, but it is something to think about).
The report focuses on the one aspect of gaming I have felt for a long time has been largely overlooked by many people- how parents monitor their gaming children and what they know about video games in general. I’ve been praying for other people to figure this out for a long time. Television commercials are the biggest giveaway as to what’s going on in this country. It is very hard to avoid ads dealing with talking to kids about sex, smoking or drugs. To me this is scary- parents should not need reminders to talk to their children. Just taking into account the number of ads on television it makes me think parents are watching television instead of spending time with their kids. Is it so unreasonable to think that kids spend too much time in front of a television because their parents are doing the same exact thing?
Continuing with the knowledge side of gaming, what parents know about the games their kids play is also something that is severely lacking. It pains me to say this but I spend enough time in video game stores to overhear multiple conversations between parents, clerk, and kids about potential video game purchases. While it does not appear to happen nearly as often as in the past, clerks are still willing to skew the truths about games to parents in order to make a sale. Having never worked in retail I do not know this, but if video game store clerks work on commission this needs to stop immediately.
It pains me to say this even more, but video game clerks need a brush up on their education as well. No, I don’t expect Rhodes scholars to be working at my local EB store, but the situation needs to improve dramatically. Just yesterday a clerk actually had to ask a superior if Rainbow Six: Las Vegas had been released. If you don’t even know what you’re selling how can you honestly have a job? I feel there should have been some payment for the half hour I spent in the store due to the number of questions I wound up answering for people. I already felt that parental education needed to improve when it came to gaming, but now I’m also forced to believe that the retailers need more knowledge about their own business.
In case you have noticed a common thread in these ramblings, namely education, then you know mostly everything you need to know about what I read. I don’t want to bore anyone to death here about everything that’s written, but if you want to know more about what people see in the video game world rummaging through the whole report is time well spent. A lot of different surveys and observations all point to two major themes- parents need more education about gaming and so do the retailers. The gaming industry is doing what it can, but until its customers became more enlightened then the media will keep attacking the gaming industry whenever it can. It’s as I said earlier- idiocy is borne out of ignorance.
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