102: Open World Games & Batman in Man of Steel Sequel
This week, we discuss the move of many next-gen games to open world and the SDCC announcement that Batman will appear in the Man of Steel sequel. We also discuss spoilers.
I have a friend that believes that if a movie has been out for longer than 6 months then it's fair game to spoil. I've had many movies spoiled because of her. Like the part in the Avengers where...
Agent Coulson gets killed by Loki
...and I wasn't a happy camper when she just let that go. I will admit only a real handful of them I actually cared about, and most of them were movies I had no intension of seeing anyways and just let her spoil them.
If it's something I want to experience myself then I'm really sensitive to spoilers because to me that still ruins the experience, but if it's something I couldn't care less about then spoil away.
Yes, the 10:54 glitch just moved from funny to annoying. Sometimes my cursor won't sit on 10:55, so I miss some seconds.
Music and aliens: Mars Attacks! had the whole country music being a weak spot for the martians. I also remember somewhere in the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy books or radio shows there was this massive rock band that was so loud that they had to play from space when they went to a planet because the sound just obliterated the ground or something like that.
Hmm, I'll email our IT department to let them know about it; hopefully we can find a solution soon. My first suggestion will be to try clearing out your cache before listening to the podcat to see if that helps clear up the 10:54 glitch.
So random stab at the spoiler formula without informed consent to spoil.
If RQ/TI < 1 than you can spoil
T = Time since its released (for more recent media use months, older media use years)
Q = Quality of work 1-10 (1 = Sharknado, 10 = Citizen Kane)
R = Its relevance to the subject 0-10 (0 = doesn't care, 10 = boarder-line religion)
I = Negative impact to the overall work if spoiled 1-10 (1 does nothing, 10 is major/central plot hook/twist)
There's at least one more factor in the whole spoiler thing that you didn't touch on at all: regions.
Game of thrones for example is not being broadcast by any channel where I live and the DVD's don't come out until a full year after the season has ended in the U.S. Translation: I can't legally watch season 3 until early summer next year. Thus creating this weird situation where pretty much every website I visit is abuzz with red weddings and whatnot while, for all intents and purposes, season 2 just ended for me. Greaaaaat...
I'm surprised Fight Club wasn't mentioned in their conversation of spoiler, because the spoiler ruins the entire movie but not knowing it has such an impact, its also much better a second time through.
I realize I'm in the minority here but I prefer the enclosed storytelling involved in the FF type RPG to those of a Fallout/Oblivion. Open world typically means poor character development with 500 tiny stories (20 of which might be intriguing). Open world also means that there is little to no feeling of a lasting impact on the world.
I can only speak in generalities of course. For all I know FF will be open in the way that FF2 & FF3 were for the SNES in that you could explore certain regions but it still had a character driven story with an impact on the world.
Criticising a story for not being good when you don't experience it the way it was meant to is a bit unfair.
I like mysteries, and in them spoilers can ruin the experience. I lost all interest in Shutter Island when it was spoiled for me.
As for spoilers, it's not just how long something has been out, but rather how likely it is your target audience is aware of it. Some little known foreign mystery story from a decade ago is probably not as well known than a big Hollywood movie from a few months ago.
Hmm, I'll email our IT department to let them know about it; hopefully we can find a solution soon. My first suggestion will be to try clearing out your cache before listening to the podcat to see if that helps clear up the 10:54 glitch.
I am actually torn on spoilers, and for 2 very distinct reasons either:
1.
a spoiler is taking a subsection of a story, and placing it out of context, or by delivering the story out of sequence so that it does not have the same impact/suspense.
so basically if you think of spoilers in this way its kind of like hearing the puch-line to the joke before you hear the setup. like a spoiler of "characterX is killed by characterY" that on it's own shouldn't mean anything because knowing that characterX is going to die (depending of the genre: if horror/slasher then 50-90% of the lead cast is expendable anyways, if action/adventure then 10-50% of the lead cast is expendable, but only for pivotal encouragement, but I digress cause I could be here all day) is just going to be one portion of one scene, but the act of the character dying isn't important it is: what they were doing, who killed them, why they were killed, and foremost how they died.
knowing that characterX is going to betray their friends again doesn't mean anything, but: why they betrayed them, how did they betray them, and what price was paid by who for this betrayal. these are the important parts, so if you wore to say "and then this character betrays their team" you aren't actually saying anything. you haven't modified my enjoyment of the content all you have done is just engaged more question into my mind, and told me you don't know how to tell a story, or a joke.
or 2.
a spoiler literally removes all potential investment to the work then why was the work even supposed to be of interest anyways. this also lends itself to the instance of a movie/show/book you can only consume once, or else it has no value.
if we dissect this logically based on what (Justin? [one on far left] I am so bad with names I will not go into that issue) was saying if the spoiler literally destroys the ability to consume the piece meaningfully then was it really worthwhile for it to be a "secret" in the first place. I know that even Bob has chastised directors/writers/movies for having their movie being completely based around a single "twist" so that once you know it that's it, "nothing else is of value here".
what does this really infer to the viewer/consumer the content essentially saying "I got a secret, but I'm not going to tell you till later if at all" over, and over, and over.... again. basically is the same as that same content calling me a stupid child.
I think the reason that most spoiler have no effect on me is that I really haven't seen/heard/read a piece of content where knowing one pivotal part completely modified my enjoyment of it. like with Into Darkness know who the bad guy was/is didn't do anything because you have just given me a name (yes I know the majority of that character's back story, and considering my aforementioned issue with names) you haven't told me anything about why I should care.
how about this the next time you go to put down a spoiler how about instead you don't just give the one line "characterX gets killed by characterY" give the actual scene. tell the reading who these people were, tell the reader why they were killed, tell the reader how it happened, tell the reader why we should even care that the person died in the first place.
Snape kills Dumbledore
Snape after revealing himself to Harry while attempting to remain invisible to the others in the room. walks toward Dumbledore who is being held at wand point by another. Snape pulls out his wand, and without any other sign, or word kills Dumbledore, as the person holding him at wand point was appearing reluctant
this form not only allows the read of your spoiler to have a sense of caring for what is going on, but also gives them still an amount of unknowns that they could still enjoy the content themselves.
Too many times these spoiler don't damage the content the way so many people artificially think they do they just point out the value personX has at telling/relaying a story, or it just says how dumb that scene in the content even was, or worse yet how dumb the content was to begin with. because sometimes knowing plot-twistX doesn't destroy the movie for me it allows me to consume the content completely once, or know if the content is even worth seeing.
If I avoided spoilers then I would have seen movies like "The Life of Pie", and been pissed off that no buddy told me how much crap it was.
The important point for me with spoilers is that seeing/reading something knowing spoiler information is a different experience to seeing/reading it without the spoiler information.
Maybe both experiences are really fun, or the spoiled version is even more fun... But if it hadnt been spoiled for me I could have experienced it without spoilers and then also experienced it with the spoiler knowledge. Two enjoyable experiences, and the opportunity for one of them would have been completely ruined if Id received spoilers.
Another interesting thought came up as a side note in the discussion, too - is the "time limit" idea on spoilers still valid for something that is changing formats? I think the specific example from the podcat that made me think of it was a story from comics that is now the probable basis for a movie. Ive had plenty of time to read the comic if I wanted... but I dont particularly enjoy comics. I do enjoy movies. Is it still ok to spoil the movie because the story existed in comics for a long time?
You're completely right. It's not cool to spoiler things for people that they can't watch at all or have to wait for. That's a complete exception to any other spoiler rule.
Otherwise, I'm surprised nobody is offended by my cavalier approach to spoilers. I guess that means I should just carry on, then.
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