When game players, academics, journalists, developers, and miscellaneous hanger-ons talk about games, we tend to use absolutes. This ranges from subjects sublime – “Call of Duty 4 PWNS Crysis!” – to the more mundane – “…my last Kotaku feature… asserted that classic buttons-and-sticks work well because it's more interesting to abstract interaction in game worlds rather than act it out literally.”[1]
This is not a conversational feature exclusive to gamers. People like to talk in absolutes, especially when it comes to intangibles. Alexander’s assertion is similar to writing teachers who say that third-person viewpoint is easier for readers to get into because they can step into the character without the clutter of first-person thoughts reminding them this character is their own person. Or Scott McCloud’s comment that simple, abstract representations of faces are easier to plug into than complex, photorealistic representations. [2]
The actual Kotaku article, In Defense of the Classic Controller follows the conceits of modern journalism and in that it provides a ‘balanced overview’ of the ‘issue.’ (It’s also difficult to find. @Kotaku - front page is #navigationfail)
I believe the real issue is that the Wii won the console war. If the traditional controller were inherently more interesting than the Wii-mote, it’s strange that a console whose main draw was the price point and games that utilized a different control method would trounce the PS3 and Xbox 360, established systems with a wide library of games and impressive graphics. One idea tossed up is that mere novelty is behind the success, but while the Wii-mote may seem awfully different to those of us who have been weaned on the two thumbsticks, four buttons, and bumpers mode of controlling a game and the WASDers, it’s hardly a new idea.
I wasted many quarters in the Chuck E Cheese arcade playing whack-a-mole with a physical mallet; Cruise USA with a physical wheel, and gas and break petals; and Duck Hunt with a physical gun. [3] I never found myself longing for the abstraction of a stick-and-buttons controller with these games, and I don’t believe that people who play Guitar Hero, Dance-Dance Revolution, et alii, would consider the games more interesting if control was more abstract.
The first video game system, the Magnavox Odyssey, had a light gun for its Shooting Gallery game. [4] The Wii isn’t a novel concept; it’s technology finally supporting an old (in game terms) concept. Project Natal builds off that. (We’ll see if Microsoft is able to continue its track record of taking other’s successful ideas and striking gold with them.)
The article states: “The more pressing issue is whether or not controller-less gaming will truly make the medium richer. Making something "more accessible" doesn't necessarily make it better.”
Okay, we can have a medium in which there is only the stick-and-buttons controller, or one in which there is the stick-and-buttons controller, the wii-mote, motion capture, and the various guns, guitars, and dance pads. Unless her suggestion is that if we embrace new technologies, we must chuck the old ones out, it seems evident to me that games become a richer medium when we have a diversity of interactive devices.
Alexander is essentially espousing a Luddite philosophy, and like most Luddites, it’s not the change in equipment, but the change in culture it brings. The stick-and-buttons controller doesn’t need defense because it’s going to disappear, but because others find different, newer controllers better. A lot of others! The anxiety she alludes to is similar to that of a dedicated Everquest player watching the membership of World of Warcraft skyrocket. Instead of being the mainstream of a niche culture, in ten or twenty years, today’s PS3 and Xbox players may become the niche of a mainstream culture.
[1] – Sexy Videogameland: Imagination and abstraction, Leigh Alexander
[2] – Understanding Comics, Scott McCloud
[3] – You can’t shoot the dog, but I always tried.
[4] – Wikipedia is never wrong!
This is not a conversational feature exclusive to gamers. People like to talk in absolutes, especially when it comes to intangibles. Alexander’s assertion is similar to writing teachers who say that third-person viewpoint is easier for readers to get into because they can step into the character without the clutter of first-person thoughts reminding them this character is their own person. Or Scott McCloud’s comment that simple, abstract representations of faces are easier to plug into than complex, photorealistic representations. [2]
The actual Kotaku article, In Defense of the Classic Controller follows the conceits of modern journalism and in that it provides a ‘balanced overview’ of the ‘issue.’ (It’s also difficult to find. @Kotaku - front page is #navigationfail)
I believe the real issue is that the Wii won the console war. If the traditional controller were inherently more interesting than the Wii-mote, it’s strange that a console whose main draw was the price point and games that utilized a different control method would trounce the PS3 and Xbox 360, established systems with a wide library of games and impressive graphics. One idea tossed up is that mere novelty is behind the success, but while the Wii-mote may seem awfully different to those of us who have been weaned on the two thumbsticks, four buttons, and bumpers mode of controlling a game and the WASDers, it’s hardly a new idea.
I wasted many quarters in the Chuck E Cheese arcade playing whack-a-mole with a physical mallet; Cruise USA with a physical wheel, and gas and break petals; and Duck Hunt with a physical gun. [3] I never found myself longing for the abstraction of a stick-and-buttons controller with these games, and I don’t believe that people who play Guitar Hero, Dance-Dance Revolution, et alii, would consider the games more interesting if control was more abstract.
The first video game system, the Magnavox Odyssey, had a light gun for its Shooting Gallery game. [4] The Wii isn’t a novel concept; it’s technology finally supporting an old (in game terms) concept. Project Natal builds off that. (We’ll see if Microsoft is able to continue its track record of taking other’s successful ideas and striking gold with them.)
The article states: “The more pressing issue is whether or not controller-less gaming will truly make the medium richer. Making something "more accessible" doesn't necessarily make it better.”
Okay, we can have a medium in which there is only the stick-and-buttons controller, or one in which there is the stick-and-buttons controller, the wii-mote, motion capture, and the various guns, guitars, and dance pads. Unless her suggestion is that if we embrace new technologies, we must chuck the old ones out, it seems evident to me that games become a richer medium when we have a diversity of interactive devices.
Alexander is essentially espousing a Luddite philosophy, and like most Luddites, it’s not the change in equipment, but the change in culture it brings. The stick-and-buttons controller doesn’t need defense because it’s going to disappear, but because others find different, newer controllers better. A lot of others! The anxiety she alludes to is similar to that of a dedicated Everquest player watching the membership of World of Warcraft skyrocket. Instead of being the mainstream of a niche culture, in ten or twenty years, today’s PS3 and Xbox players may become the niche of a mainstream culture.
[1] – Sexy Videogameland: Imagination and abstraction, Leigh Alexander
[2] – Understanding Comics, Scott McCloud
[3] – You can’t shoot the dog, but I always tried.
[4] – Wikipedia is never wrong!
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