You might remember Extra Credits from this site before they moved on over to Penny Arcade. I used to watch their videos and then stopped, watching their latest one, I remembered why. To me they're just really pretentious, they talk a good game but don't seem to get results.
They'll talk all artsy about games like Loneliness but skimp on the examples and implementations. It just bugs me that if they think they know so much better then why don't they make a flash game themselves? (they were able to raise enough money for surgery or whatever)
Or talk about how they would develop their own game. It's not even a forum of discussion since you can only leave comments and emails, which they might reply to singularly.
They'll spend the episode talking about "X game does Y, and what Y could do for the industry". But never HOW, they talk in hypotheticals, how "that" mechanic would "pervade" the game without any examples or sources to back that up.
They bring up the Rat Man rooms in Portal and "that scene" Bioshock, but those examples (to me) are lacking and forbearing on the overall topic. Specific examples in a game can't be sources for good "metaphor mechanics" if the example is singular and not overbearing throughout the whole game. Otherwise I could say that the X scene in Y game was just as effective.
They also don't seem to offer any criticism either, rather than just glossing over That Game Company, they should pick apart their games and discuss what doesn't work just as much what does. WHAT concepts were presented and HOW they were explored in Flower, Flow, and Journey? Were these concepts successfully executed? Why not? How could they've been?
And I really hate to say it, but that's kinda why I like Yahtzee, he'll go into the details (like in his Silent Hill 2 review) and really explain why what works and how, and what doesn't and why. After the end of every Extra Credits episode I have the same "....so what do you expect to DO about it?" feeling.
Discussing Loneliness, I don't think it's some kind of Rorschach test that uses "mechanics as metaphor". The game has a d-pad, that's it, that's not mechanics, that's 4 buttons less of a controller. Loneliness I think did a terrible job of exploring what loneliness really is. Anyone who's ever suffered the depressing power of loneliness knows that you could've joined any of those groups and you would still have felt alone. They make all these assumptions about the player, I didn't have any fleeting thoughts of acceptance or rejection while playing. This might reflect poorly on me but I NEVER personified the dots, because they're dots. Not people. I just thought "wow, shit's ghey". I have an imagination, but you kinda have to provide a little context.
They'll talk all artsy about games like Loneliness but skimp on the examples and implementations. It just bugs me that if they think they know so much better then why don't they make a flash game themselves? (they were able to raise enough money for surgery or whatever)
Or talk about how they would develop their own game. It's not even a forum of discussion since you can only leave comments and emails, which they might reply to singularly.
They'll spend the episode talking about "X game does Y, and what Y could do for the industry". But never HOW, they talk in hypotheticals, how "that" mechanic would "pervade" the game without any examples or sources to back that up.
They bring up the Rat Man rooms in Portal and "that scene" Bioshock, but those examples (to me) are lacking and forbearing on the overall topic. Specific examples in a game can't be sources for good "metaphor mechanics" if the example is singular and not overbearing throughout the whole game. Otherwise I could say that the X scene in Y game was just as effective.
They also don't seem to offer any criticism either, rather than just glossing over That Game Company, they should pick apart their games and discuss what doesn't work just as much what does. WHAT concepts were presented and HOW they were explored in Flower, Flow, and Journey? Were these concepts successfully executed? Why not? How could they've been?
And I really hate to say it, but that's kinda why I like Yahtzee, he'll go into the details (like in his Silent Hill 2 review) and really explain why what works and how, and what doesn't and why. After the end of every Extra Credits episode I have the same "....so what do you expect to DO about it?" feeling.
Discussing Loneliness, I don't think it's some kind of Rorschach test that uses "mechanics as metaphor". The game has a d-pad, that's it, that's not mechanics, that's 4 buttons less of a controller. Loneliness I think did a terrible job of exploring what loneliness really is. Anyone who's ever suffered the depressing power of loneliness knows that you could've joined any of those groups and you would still have felt alone. They make all these assumptions about the player, I didn't have any fleeting thoughts of acceptance or rejection while playing. This might reflect poorly on me but I NEVER personified the dots, because they're dots. Not people. I just thought "wow, shit's ghey". I have an imagination, but you kinda have to provide a little context.
