Jimquisition: Videogames Are Not Movies, Get Over It

KoDOmega

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Oh my... a snarky Brit with a strong opinion about videogames? Truly the Escapist has no shortage of original videos to feature! :p

But in all seriousness... Jim? You have my attention. Why? Because you care about games. You care about them becoming more than they are, and that's an attitude I always want to support. Enjoy feeding on the trolls, and here's to a long and happy run on the site.
 

GloatingSwine

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Jumplion said:
It proved that you don't need explosions, gunplay, or blood+guts everywhere to sell a game,
And meanwhile Wii Sports is the highest selling game of all time and is so "mature" your gran could play it.

David Cage, Ur Doin It Rong.
 

Saviordd1

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Brainst0rm said:
So...it's entertaining because he says "fuck" a lot?

'Cause, otherwise, I feel like I've missed the joke.
Not everything is supposed to be funny...
 

Moriarty

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jcg said:
Yet would make a bicycle like you would make a chair? The problem is that different media require different methods. A book can spent a chapter about how scary a hallway is. In a film you might show the hallway with sound effects. In a game you drop the player in the hallway and let find him/her out the hallway is scary.

Now image a narrator telling you the hallway is scary while you see it in a movie, it might break the immersion. Yet some games do just that, the break into a cutscene with cinematic effects, which jerks you away from your character and breaks some of the immersion.

Yes it's easier to make a point with a cutscene, because how else do you keep the player in the hallway long enough so he/she discovers it's scary.
Sorry but.. what? I can't even make out wether you're agreeing with me or not.

It may be easier to make a point with a cutscene, but it isn't impossible without one either. Check out Amnesia: The Dark Descent about the specific example you mentioned.
On the other hand cutscenes themselves aren't bad at all. Only if done badly, or maybe overdone cutscenes can frustrate players, but taking away the players control to set the scene or for plot exposition has always existed in games, at least since games have actual storylines outside of manuals.
 

zehydra

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Good content, the presentation of said content needs work however.


Anyhoo, while I agree with many of Jim's points, I think he has also failed to see that games do not automatically qualify as A STORY-TELLING MEDIUM.

They can be, and are often used to be Story-tellers, but that's not the main focus of games.

I think my opinions can pretty much be summed up as "take what Jim said, but replace 'Movies' with 'story-telling devices'".

If that makes sense.
 

Cousin_IT

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Thought that was pretty good; though it was a bit too Pen & Teller's Bullshit, minus a mute co-host & Pen has swollen up a tad.
 

Sparrow

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Brainst0rm said:
So...it's entertaining because he says "fuck" a lot?

'Cause, otherwise, I feel like I've missed the joke.
I concur with this statement. This man makes me ashamed to be English. Please remove his content from the site.

Seriously though. What did I just watch? That wasn't amusing in any way, that was just a guy being an arsehole for 10 minutes. Call me an elitist prick, but doesn't everything this man stands for abuse the Code of Conduct for the site? You know, the whole "don't be a jerk" rule followed by the bit about "making the forum a less pleasant place"? You even promote him as a "douchebag".
 

MatsVS

Tea & Grief
Nov 9, 2009
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GloatingSwine said:
MatsVS said:
Jim Sterling said:
That says films has better stories. Look at some of the films out there; that ain't fucking true most of the time.
Yes it is, unfortunately.
Not really. Most film stories are utter toss. Over the last 20 or more years Hollywood in particular has been reducing the number of themes and constructs it uses in storytelling to a vastly reduced pool, so much so that you can almost tell from the poster the entire story of the film.
I did not mean to imply that stories in film are generally good. They most certainly are not. Still, it's a safe bet to say that for every game with a genuinely well told story, there are dozens and dozens of films with an equally or better told story. Not to mention that games have never reached the same heights of narrative quality that films has.
 

AWDMANOUT

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TheSkaAssassin said:
o...k...

I don't get it. Why do we need more videos people rambling into a microphone and calling it "commentary"? We have Yahtzee, Movie Bob (twice a week), and Extra Credits.
I whole-heartedly agree. Ever since D&A left there's a comedy-sized hole in my heart that LRR can't make up for on its own.

Captcha: Research rseech

CAPTCHA HAS SPOKEN. I will now look up what rseech means.
 

timrattray

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Mar 15, 2011
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In my opinion, his "Bias Reviews" Jimquisition is by far his best. Check it out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W-oeOqgRi7E
 

Lazarus Long

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Harry Mason said:
Good lord, that was awful. I would give up my Silent Hill collection to see Yahtzee physically spank this man. He stumbled over his words, pretended to be angry so poorly it made me sad, and the glasses look like a completely transparent attempt at creating a signature "look."

I'm not usually the person to be snotty about these types of things, but I've come to expect a certain level of quality from Escapist shows, and GOOD GOD THAT WAS TERRIBLE. I even AGREE with him and I hated the show.

You know what? Scratch that. I want to see Lisa Foiles hit him with the Irritating Stick. This guy takes himself WAY too seriously. I will give this show another episode to be fair, but that was truly awful.
Wow. There is not a single thing that was on my mind when I stopped the video that you did not say. Well played, sir. Fantastic ninja skills.

I'm willing to experience this bij one more time if the topic is interesting, but my expectations will be rather low.
 

thisbymaster

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Would have been better written the pictures didn't add anything to the argument and there were not funny like Extra credits. The pictures should reinforce the ideas or bring up tangents to the ideas. I can't say I laughed or found that he had anything to say that I hadn't already heard before. Maybe this time he was beating a dead horse, maybe if he had a fresher topic. I will watch twice more.
 

Woodsey

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Jumplion said:
Woodsey said:
But he's not moving it forward - if he was then yes, I might stomach him a bit more.
Eh, debatable. I for one am glad that a game like Heavy Rain exists (and yes, it is a game, I don't care what anyone else says) and was as successful as it was. While it certainly had its flaws, I prefer to look at it in a more optimistic light and say that it's developing the medium in some way. It proved that you don't need explosions, gunplay, or blood+guts everywhere to sell a game, you can have a more mature, more adult game (whether or not is succeeded is beside the point).

As for him being passionate about it, I'm pretty sure I've heard him actively shun the idea of being called a game developer. He wants to be a film writer/director, and his lack of talent means he never got to do that.
That's more on what he thinks he is. He's still passionate about his visions and whatnot, and I respect that to an extent. I do think gaming needs a few more auteurs like with movies, it helps focus the direction a game would go.

Its just a shame that we put him on a pedestal.
I think Cage just imagines the pedestal is there ;P
"I think Cage just imagines the pedestal is there"

You've just put him on one.

And what's the point in looking at it in an optimistic light "just because"? We can use Minecraft to show how popular games can be without the need for violence. We can use Half Life and Portal for dialogue and storytelling. We can use Mafia and PoP: The Sands of Time for a strong leading character, for character development and chemistry.

David Cage is irrelevant. All those games did what he thinks he can do (they also fit in more than just the categories I put them in by the way, just using their best features), and they did it much better.
 

Delusibeta

Reachin' out...
Mar 7, 2010
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Meanwhile, at Destructoid... [http://www.destructoid.com/the-jimquisition-games-are-not-movies-get-over-it-199097.phtml]

I am surprised at the amount of comments on here that amount to "Huh? Who?", since Jim is one of the main attractions of Destructoid, and yet The Escapist has managed to nab him. It's like Yathzee doing an opinion series on Destructoid.
 

probunk

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Nov 12, 2009
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Augh...no, no, no. Boring, artless delivery style, absolutely no humor, and a five minute 'rant' (I hesitate to call it that because it implies some emotional connection or Yahtzee-style humour) that could have fit inside a thirty-second clip. Absolute crap, I shan't be watching again.
 

GloatingSwine

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MatsVS said:
I did not mean to imply that stories in film are generally good. They most certainly are not. Still, it's a safe bet to say that for every game with a genuinely well told story, there are dozens and dozens of films with an equally or better told story. Not to mention that games have never reached the same heights of narrative quality that films has.
On the other hand, games able to really deliver a strong narrative as games have not been around for a particularly long time. The field from which really good narratives can be drawn is much smaller.

Games do have an inherent advantage over films though, which is the interactive component. The player is far more personally involved in a story that they've contributed to by their actions, even if those actions are as simple as walking a character from point A to point B so they can have a cutscene and a bossfight (which is why you'll occasionally hear people saying that the confused messes that comprise the average JRPG story are "good").