That game is probably the most concise summary of all the philosophical issues associated with the concept of Free Will. And the good News is: It won't take as long to read as anything Tomas Aquinas wrote and it will be cheaper than any of his books!
The Stanley Parable is... is... wow...
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All of Aquinis' works are public domain and available online. Specific translations will not be public domain, but you can read it all for free.Exterminas said:
That said, he had an incredibly boring writing style in my opinion. At least it was pretty straightforward in that it wasn't hard to discern what he meant (a complaint I frequently levy at Kant).
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So... because it contains a silly easter egg that no one in their right mind would find, it's worthless. Noted.T_ConX said:
That is perfectly true. I was using "book" in the sense of "actual physical book", which still cost quite a lot in my corner of the world, despite the fact that the text itself is free.Weaver said:
I really love the arguments people bring to not buy an awesome 10 dollar game.
- It was free back when it contained less contend and looked worse. UNACCEPTABLE!
- One of the thousand jokes isn't funny. UNACCEPTABLE!
- The boring story, that nobody cares about, only takes about 2 minutes. UNACCEPTABLE!
- It was free back when it contained less contend and looked worse. UNACCEPTABLE!
- One of the thousand jokes isn't funny. UNACCEPTABLE!
- The boring story, that nobody cares about, only takes about 2 minutes. UNACCEPTABLE!
Well i bought it, I 'played' it for a bit more than half an hour and my opinion is that if you like gameplay this thing is not for you. If you like a good story it's also not really for you because the basic plot is under 5 min if you don't stop and just follow the clues you are given, and just following orders is not the way to go here, but the 3 other endings I got where only a bit longer to walk through and just added confusion.
I do not consider this a game, or a good story.
I do not agree that if you like the hitchhikers gttg you like this, the humour isn't nearly as good in this.
I do consider it an interesting 30 minutes, and since 12$ is not really that much I consider it not a waste of money.
But it's not a game, do not buy it unless you want an interactive story.
I do not consider this a game, or a good story.
I do not agree that if you like the hitchhikers gttg you like this, the humour isn't nearly as good in this.
I do consider it an interesting 30 minutes, and since 12$ is not really that much I consider it not a waste of money.
But it's not a game, do not buy it unless you want an interactive story.
I'm going to have to disagree with you on what makes a game a game. Interactive stories are games in my opinion. What are your thoughts on say, visual novels?smokingplane said:
bluepotatosack said:
I wouldn't call those games eighter. They're visual novels.
It needs a lot more player interaction before I call it a game.
Would you consider a dvd with a lot of extra's and several available soundtracks a game just because you can contole the speed of playback , play some gimicy games and choose the available audiotrack? Because thats almost the same level of interaction that most visual novels offer.
This is offcourse just my personal opinion, but a game needs to offer more gameplay before I call it a game.
The Stanley parable needs a lot more input to progress the story, but it's not gameplay, it's more like a bad dvdplayer where you need to keep the play button pressed down to make it go forward and you have to give it a wack now and then when it's stuck, depending where you hit it it jumps some tracks so you might get the normal or the extended edition or the blooperreel ending.
It's very well done, and entertaining but it's not a 'game'.
The DVD as a whole? No, of course not. The games included on that DVD I would call games, though.smokingplane said:
So let's look at RPG's now. Particularly western ones. Oftentimes they will offer you branching pathways in a very straightforward manner. In say, a dialogue choice. Is making that decision not a part of gameplay?
Dude, chill. The problem is it's a game of many short routes and a ton of endings. There is literally an ending you can get without leaving the first room in the game. It's not about gameplay, you either find an ending or you don't. So:A choose your own adventure book that manages to hide some paths. So if the story is incredibly simple and the story paths are short enough where you probably can't write a paragraph about them without saying the whole ending it's difficult to describe it cohesively without spoiling shit.Weaver said:
Like if I was forced to describe it without spoiling it:I would just say it's a comedy game that you probably won't laugh at directly but you'll probably be grinning ear to ear or really thinking the whole time, and it's 90% carried by the narrator.
Uh... no. Its not like Gone Home. Though I think Gone Home was pretty good. It just deliberately tricked people into thinking it was a horror game when it was really a love story. Which I didn't really mind, but I can see why that would annoy some people.KevinHe92 said:
As for The Stanley Parable... the new version is very different from the original. There are more endings, many of which you have to be very alert and explore every possible point of interaction in the game in order to find them...
and even in the endings that return from the original, none of them are complete complete copy-pastes of the original. They have some new content as well...
and there are a lot more easter eggs. There's even a next-to-impossible achievement (aptly titled "Unachievable") that... some people have gotten already... and STILL no one really knows how to get it.
Also, the narration is genuinely funny and creepy when it needs to be. Plus, there are plenty of ways to screw with the narrator... hell, that's half the fun, finding all of the little ways you can irritate the voice in your head.
No no, it is perfectly valid to not like what you and I like. Everybody are not entertained or challenged by the same things -- especially in scenarios where, for example, the thing is a truism or repeat experience for them (You've already seen film B, that does thing X better, so, in your mind, what's so good about film A? ...even if film A did X first and possibly inspired film B).Amaror said:
I have one memory etched into my mind, where I was watching an episode of Blackadder and was having a wicked laugh at a particularly nasty remark, wrapped in the usual convoluted metaphor, from Edmund to Baldrick. The person next to me does not find that sort of thing entertaining and didn't see the joke - at all, but chuckled along politely and offered: "Yes, those are funny hats, that they are wearing, aren't they..?"
Not a stupid person; just different tastes, values, and/or points in life.
Some are just trolls, of course, trying to get a rise out of you -- once uncertains have squandered one chance to prove themselves actual debaters: Ignore.
I'll admit that I am taking one piece of base satisfaction from all this: Back when Dear Esther went commercial, there were some people who tried to use The Stanley Parable as a weapon against the former, and any these people who may be doing a forum round this time as well, now find themselves on the receiving end of pretty much their own old arguments.
In the rpgs that spring to mind (skyrim, dishonoured, mass effect,..) I don't consider the dialog options gameplay. They just pause the game, usually freezing time in the gameworld so that you can mow your lawn before you choose to continue playing. That's not a game mechanic, it's a pause button, where the resume play button is hidden under some dialog.bluepotatosack said:
Mostly you can spot the 'wright' answer (the one that progresses the game) but you have the ability to dick around with other pieces of dialog untill you get the one you want/need.
The story and dialog might be a (big) part of the game, it should be there to give context to the game, but it's not gameplay, just as in an old arcade 'on rails shooter' the part where you move to the next scene once everthing killable is dead isn't gameplay (you drop your gun and relax for a sec untill the game starts rolling again). You need those things to get a good game but that part is not gameplay.
Another analogy, tv/movies use multiple camera angles in conversations to get their story told in a visually pleasing way. Would you consider the swapping between viewing angles a part of the story, or just a technical trick to visually get a better scene, thus enhancing the story, without being it a part of the story?
The problem is the definition of gameplay for different people I guess. So I'll try to define what I see as gameplay.
I think gameplay is the part of the game that gets harder if you adjust the difficulty.
This doesn't need to be adjustable by the player, I think we can all agree that every mario game for example could be more difficult by just adding opponents (or make them faster) there is still an adjustable difficulty, it's just fixed by the devs.
If there is no difficulty to adjust, there usually is no gameplay to speak off and then I don't call it a game, it's something else.
Besides the highly pretentious ending that thinks you are too stupid to understand the point of the game, I am enjoying myself so far. I haven't played too much yet but one of the endings was very depressing. I really did want to stay and enjoy the colourful room with the narrator but didn't really want have the game going forever. Maybe he knew that if I actually stayed with him forever, I would have to waste away at my computer chair and die. His voice sounded so sad when I made my final crash down. I would like to believe that he really did want me to be happy but I'm not sure. Haven't seen such a depressing moment in a video game for quite some time.
So I caved and bought it. Oh well, it was actually pretty good. I'm going to try and milk value out of it by convincing my friends to play it and seeing their reaction. The Stanley Parable is more of an experience than a game, and this is the definitive version of that experience.OlasDAlmighty said:
So I caved and bought it. Oh well, it was actually pretty good. I'm going to try and milk value out of it by convincing my friends to play it and seeing their reaction. The Stanley Parable is more of an experience than a game, and this is the definitive version of that experience.OlasDAlmighty said:
Are you sure he's not talking about the baby game? Because while that might be terrible itself, the fact that they actually included dialogue and an entire ending for if you push the button for 4 hours is kinda awesome.[REDACTED said:
I never claimed that it wasn't ok to not like the stanley parable.Somebloke said:
I was criticizing stupid arguments made against the game.
They are free to not like it all they want, but they shouldn't try to justify their decision with a one minute video of one tiny part of the game that they watched.
I liked the Stanley Parable. I had played the free mod before, but the new game has enough extra content and extra detail to make it worth it. It's a non-game game, kind of like Dear Esther but less pretentious, funnier, and more interactive.
Kind of wish there was more to it, though. Less than thee hours in, I think I've followed every possible path through the story.
Kind of wish there was more to it, though. Less than thee hours in, I think I've followed every possible path through the story.