Your opinion: The most overused phrase in gaming.

[G00N3R7883]

Some good ones already mentioned but I want to say something different, so I'll go with "realistic". No, games are not realistic.

Realistic gameplay would mean you get shot once and that's it. Game over. And we're not even talking permadeath where you can start a new game. You're dead, and you can never play the game again. Games can't be realistic because they have to be fun.

And I often see the word associated with graphics. Again, no. We are probably decades away from actual real life quality graphics. If you can't tell the difference between a currently existing game and real life just by looking at them, you need to get your eyes checked out. (And because this is the internet, before anyone accuses me of being insensitive, I wear glasses).

 

[Starbird]

"I'm afraid it isn't over...it has only just begun"...

Oh, you mean from other players?

"It's just a game, don't be mad" from that guy trolling your team in LoL.
"Casualcore"
"Co-op is a fantastic addition to single player mode"
"Online only"

 

[Aesir23]

Let's see...

Hardcore, Casual, PC Master Race, Console Peasant.

Pretty much anything that indicates the user somehow considers themselves 'above' another gamer for whatever arbitrary reason. It practically reeks of elitism and like they're trying to have a penis measuring contest without whipping the little fellow out.

 

[mad825]

"Pretentious". It's a word people use to put down games that dare to try to be more than dumb entertainment.

Trying isn't the word and the word doesn't suggest that in anyway.

When something is Pretentious, it is giving the illusion that it's smart. It's all fluff and no filler. all flash,no substance. The film equilibrium is an example, it pretends to be a smart film but then becomes a typical action flick.

There are hundreds of way in which one can say something is Pretentious but none of them suggests there was any real effort placed into the details.

 

[Lilani]

I think it's an even tie between "overrated" and "objective review."

Don't like a game that's really popular? That's just fine. That does not mean, however, that the game is overrated. I don't like Mega Man games, but that doesn't mean they are overrated. That just means I don't like those kinds of games. I can definitely see why they deserve the praise they receive...I just don't like them. And just because a person dislikes the linearity of a game like HL2, that doesn't mean it's poorly made. It's well-designed for what it is, if you don't like the format then you simply don't like that format. Saying a game like HL2 is overrated for being linear is like saying beef stroganoff is overrated for having noodles. If HL2 wasn't so linear it wouldn't be HL2 anymore, and if beef stroganoff didn't have noodles it wouldn't be beef stroganoff anymore. If you don't like beef stroganoff that's fine, but that doesn't mean the noodles are a flaw in the recipe.

As for objective review, the problem with that is it's a contradiction. While there are a few things which can sort of be measured objectively like playability, ease of use in the mechanics, aesthetics, etc. a lot of what makes up a person's gameplay experience has to do with personal preferences and tastes. There is no such thing as a truly objective review because if it were completely objective, it wouldn't be a review. Typically when someone trots out this phrase it's to chastise a critic for reviewing something in a different way from most critics. But every critic has a different way of analyzing things, hell the entire premise of Siskel and Ebert was teaming up two critics who have different ways of looking at things and having them each review the same thing. A truly objective review would be bland and useless. If you didn't find a certain critic's review useful, then just go find another and put the two together. That way you can perhaps divine what you need to know in order to decide if you're interested in the game or not.

 

[Fox12]

"Pretentious". It's a word people use to put down games that dare to try to be more than dumb entertainment.

games are a mean of entertainment, any "game" that does not try to be entertaining and instead wants to push some dumb "2deep4u" message or something like that IS pretentious

Nah, a game doesn't have to be fun to be worthwhile. SH2 wasn't fun, but I'll remember it far more than any of the Assasins Creed. Games don't have to be mere entertainment, and a lot of people crave something more in depth. I don't get why the "games are fun" and "games are art" groups can't get along.

 

[NuclearKangaroo]

"Pretentious". It's a word people use to put down games that dare to try to be more than dumb entertainment.

games are a mean of entertainment, any "game" that does not try to be entertaining and instead wants to push some dumb "2deep4u" message or something like that IS pretentious

Nah, a game doesn't have to be fun to be worthwhile. SH2 wasn't fun, but I'll remember it far more than any of the Assasins Creed. Games don't have to be mere entertainment, and a lot of people crave something more in depth. I don't get why the "games are fun" and "games are art" groups can't get along.

something doesnt have to make you laugh to be entertaining dude

 

[Fox12]

"Pretentious". It's a word people use to put down games that dare to try to be more than dumb entertainment.

games are a mean of entertainment, any "game" that does not try to be entertaining and instead wants to push some dumb "2deep4u" message or something like that IS pretentious

Nah, a game doesn't have to be fun to be worthwhile. SH2 wasn't fun, but I'll remember it far more than any of the Assasins Creed. Games don't have to be mere entertainment, and a lot of people crave something more in depth. I don't get why the "games are fun" and "games are art" groups can't get along.

something doesnt have to make you laugh to be entertaining dude

I didn't say it did. I wouldn't consider Silent Hill 2 "fun." I didn't have "fun" playing it in any conventional way. I didn't think Spec Ops was fun either. I like both of those games, however, because they're extremely well made, and because they made me think and feel. Tetris, on the other hand, is a lot of fun to play. It's entertaining. But, I promise you, I won't remember the time I got the high score in Tetris. I will remember James Sunderland and his wife. Despite this, both games have their place.

The only time a game is pretentious is when it tries to act smart, but is actually incredibly shallow and stupid. Case on point, David Cage.

 

[NuclearKangaroo]

"Pretentious". It's a word people use to put down games that dare to try to be more than dumb entertainment.

games are a mean of entertainment, any "game" that does not try to be entertaining and instead wants to push some dumb "2deep4u" message or something like that IS pretentious

Nah, a game doesn't have to be fun to be worthwhile. SH2 wasn't fun, but I'll remember it far more than any of the Assasins Creed. Games don't have to be mere entertainment, and a lot of people crave something more in depth. I don't get why the "games are fun" and "games are art" groups can't get along.

something doesnt have to make you laugh to be entertaining dude

I didn't say it did. I wouldn't consider Silent Hill 2 "fun." I didn't have "fun" playing it in any conventional way. I didn't think Spec Ops was fun either. I like both of those games, however, because they're extremely well made, and because they made me think and feel. Tetris, on the other hand, is a lot of fun to play. It's entertaining. But, I promise you, I won't remember the time I got the high score in Tetris. I will remember James Sunderland and his wife. Despite this, both games have their place.

The only time a game is pretentious is when it tries to act smart, but is actually incredibly shallow and stupid. Case on point, David Cage.

i think that counts as being entertained man

 

[Rayce Archer]

"Emergent."

 

[Magicite Spring]

snip

i think that counts as being entertained man

I agree with you, but I prefer to use the word "engaging" rather than "entertaining". The reason is entertaining has a connection to something being fun due to entertaining being a positive word. People rarely use entertaining to describe an experience that didn't make them feel happy. However, engaging doesn't carry that some connotation with it. Spec Ops is not an entertaining game because it isn't fun, but it is engaging and can draw the player in different ways. I bring this up cause entertaining will confuse people who will think you are talking about a game being fun, while engaging is a bit more understandable.

That is all I ask from my games: To engage me in some way whether it be through fun gameplay, an interesting story, well written characters, a detailed world or deep atmosphere.

 

[CannibalCorpses]

"Pretentious". It's a word people use to put down games that dare to try to be more than dumb entertainment.

games are a mean of entertainment, any "game" that does not try to be entertaining and instead wants to push some dumb "2deep4u" message or something like that IS pretentious

Nah, a game doesn't have to be fun to be worthwhile. SH2 wasn't fun, but I'll remember it far more than any of the Assasins Creed. Games don't have to be mere entertainment, and a lot of people crave something more in depth. I don't get why the "games are fun" and "games are art" groups can't get along.

something doesnt have to make you laugh to be entertaining dude

I didn't say it did. I wouldn't consider Silent Hill 2 "fun." I didn't have "fun" playing it in any conventional way. I didn't think Spec Ops was fun either. I like both of those games, however, because they're extremely well made, and because they made me think and feel. Tetris, on the other hand, is a lot of fun to play. It's entertaining. But, I promise you, I won't remember the time I got the high score in Tetris. I will remember James Sunderland and his wife. Despite this, both games have their place.

The only time a game is pretentious is when it tries to act smart, but is actually incredibly shallow and stupid. Case on point, David Cage.

Thats interesting because i do remember getting my 480,000 score on tetris...at school...on my gameboy...1994

 

[Grouchy Imp_v1legacy]

"-insert personal gripe here- is killing the game industry!" Casuals are killing the industry. Elitists are killing the industry. Consoles are killing the industry. The PC 'master race' (there's another overused phrase) is killing the industry. Pre-orders are. Exclusives are. DLC is. Free-to-play is. If you believe everything that get touted around with that phrase there's very little - if anything - that isn't killing the game industry.

 

[JackyG]

"Content"

When I first got a 360 all of a sudden I started noticing "saving content" instead of "saving game" since then media especially has taken up "content" like it's new flashy buzzword and it's allowed game companies to treat games like services and platforms for "delivering even more content!"

Yes, Downloadable Content especially. It's the worst word in the business in my opinion. Games aren't games any more, they're "content".

 

[remnant_phoenix]

The word "overrated" seems meaningless to me. More so, I think that the word lends itself to arrogance; it has a "I know better than you" attitude interlaced into it. "Yes, these millions of people enjoy this thing, but I think that this thing is not worthy of being enjoyed as much as it is." Sounds like self-important posturing to me.

Speaking of self-important posturing, the word "pretentious" gets thrown around way to easily. That's supposed to be reserved for situations where something/someone OBVIOUSLY lacks the depth or clout that it/he/she is claimed to have. But then it seems like any interactive experience that has even the possibility of encouraging people to think about something deeper than "I enjoy playing this game," it can get called pretentious. Why? When books/film go deeper they aren't called pretentious (unless they actually are; see above for how the word can be used effectively), so why is it different here?

My guess is that people take the word "game" too closely to heart and the paradigm of "games should be challenging and fun and nothing more" doesn't allow for any sort of depth without inviting accusations of pretense.

"Pretentious". It's a word people use to put down games that dare to try to be more than dumb entertainment.

games are a mean of entertainment, any "game" that does not try to be entertaining and instead wants to push some dumb "2deep4u" message or something like that IS pretentious

To some, games have the potential to be art. Just because you think that they are a means of entertainment and nothing more doesn't mean that they can't be anything more.

I agree that a forced/preachy message can be pretentious, but any attempt to go beyond just entertainment is not pretentious in and of itself.

For example, Deus Ex: Human Revolution was fun and challenging as a game, but it also handled the subject matter of its story in such a way that invited the player to think about the real-world implications of human augmentation and the role of corporations in sociopolitical life. The player was free to ignore the invitation, but it was there, allowing the player to go beyond the realm of entertainment and into the realm of art. Is that pretentious?

 

[remnant_phoenix]

The only word I'm tired of seeing regarding games is 'Protagonist'. Change it up a little, we're not talking about Greek mythology here.

"Protagonist(s)" is a literary word, a word used in literature and creative writing circles to refer to "the character(s) around whom the conflict of the plot is focused." It still gets used because writers use it for that purpose. I know this because my degree is in Creative Writing. And...this is a shame to admit because it betrays how much more I engaged in my creative writing classes than my literature classes, but I had no idea that the word had its roots in Ancient Greek storytelling.

 

[Scow2]

"Gaming". What's a gaming? I have always though that gaming is the process of pushing buttons to make stuff happen on the screen. Yet people find a whole lot of stuff in gaming. Gaming this, gaming that, in gaming this, in gaming that. Gaming does this, gaming does that. O-VER-USED.
If you talk about game companies - say "game companies". About games - say "games". Fuck "gaming", it does not really mean anything.

...My gaming involves books, pencils, and dice more than pushing buttons to animate screens.

 

[Fox12]

Franchise.

I hate the word franchise. Why is everything a franchise? Films, games, comics, whatever. We don't have to turn everything into a franchise, game industry. At this point it's one of those overused phrases that just grates on my nerves.

 

[Erttheking]

I have to mirror Lilani and say "objective review". Really it's become just like accusations of a paid off review. In other words "I don't agree with this review and it's the review's fault."

 

[NuclearKangaroo]

snip

i think that counts as being entertained man

I agree with you, but I prefer to use the word "engaging" rather than "entertaining". The reason is entertaining has a connection to something being fun due to entertaining being a positive word. People rarely use entertaining to describe an experience that didn't make them feel happy. However, engaging doesn't carry that some connotation with it. Spec Ops is not an entertaining game because it isn't fun, but it is engaging and can draw the player in different ways. I bring this up cause entertaining will confuse people who will think you are talking about a game being fun, while engaging is a bit more understandable.

That is all I ask from my games: To engage me in some way whether it be through fun gameplay, an interesting story, well written characters, a detailed world or deep atmosphere.

should we call entertainment, engagement then?