PaulH said:
Games for you seem to be a cheap thrill ... but would you also take the same attitude to picking up a new sport you've never had the chance to invest physical effort in like tennis or fishing? How about billiards?
All require patience, all require organization, all require time, all require effort. This culture of instant gratification in gaming reduces the complexity of experiencing videogames as a medium for the exchange of ideas and art. You're not helping the fact with your incessant diatribe against problems for which my personal experience informs me is but a base defamatory attack on a cultural medium that is both fallacious and grievous.
You're conflating "learning the rules of a game" with "creating the effort necessary to get the game to a stable starting point."
Learning how to fish = learning how to play a game.
Learning how to fish does not *require* building your own rod, your own pond, troubleshooting the reel, adjusting pH levels, updating the fish drivers, or any other hundred errors.
I go buy a rod and some bait, I can start to fish. Maybe not well, but I can fish. I don't have to study the discipline. I don't have to be a rabid hobbyist. I can just... fish.
And, I can choose to master the discipline if I want to.
But I can do it as a beginner without worry.
PC gaming is difficult for the amateur, average gamer. It's becoming increasingly marginalized, and I suspect some actually *like* that it's marginalized.
-- Chuck