The Sandbox

You knew this post was coming, right? If there's one existential question both developers and players ask about games, it is, "Can a game can be considered Art?" The latest foray into this realm I've read is Ian Bogost's "Why We Need More Boring Games" on gamasutra.com. That article is also a – perhaps unknowing – member of a set that inspires one of my personal existential questions, namely, "Why do all 'Game as Art' conversations invoke Casablanca?"

In 1996, Blizzard Entertainment came out with the Action RPG(Role Playing Game) classic Diablo. Diablo was not the first of its kind but no real-time RPG before had such a galvanizing effect on the gaming community. Indeed, Diablo featured one of the most addictive reward rhythms in the history of digitized gaming to that point.

Since Diablo, many pretenders have sprung up with varying degrees of success. To name just a few: Nox, Darkstone, Champions of Norrath, Kingdom Hearts, Divine Divinity, Dungeon Seige, Sacred, Titan Quest and Silverfall. Of course, Diablo 2 arrived in 2000 and is still considered by many to be the gold standard for the action rpg genre.

Eric-Jon Rössel Waugh has an excellent article on gamecareerguide.com on Animal Crossing, one of my favorite games. "Ambition and Compulsory Design in Animal Crossing" deals with games, goals, the motivations for play, and the platform context of a game. Well worth a read.

He calls Animal Crossing "the anti-game": there is no punishment for inaction, there is no real conflict, there is no major obstacle to collecting the widgets that, in most games, require serious effort to earn. This game should make everyone question their definition of what a game is, and what is necessary for a compelling game experience.

Why have I spent an embarrassing number of hours with Animal Crossing? Don't answer that. At least, I don't want to know the awful truth until after I finally get the lunar carpeting for my house, to go with all my other space macguffins.

Those of us who loved the Diablo games have a great appreciation for their use of sound in combat. The thunk of an arrow hitting an enemy. The meaty slashing and slushing of swords through a swath of gibbering, drooling foes. The frizzle and boom of massive AOEs lobbed like grenades into the midst of unsuspecting hordes. Sound helps make carnage delicious, indeed, and forms one of the key components of smearability.

I made a post over at Tech Talk, comparing Sony and Apple, and how Sony falters in delivering cool gadgets, while Apple tends to not do so. It's mostly techy and not gamey, but has liberal mentions of the PS3 and PSP, so there's some gaming info there, if you want to check it out.

I may as well describe what I would have hoped for from the new PSP, and why I would think it would be better than what Sony has delivered.

I posted earlier about Games as Art, a perennial topic among developers and players of games. Of course I come down on the side of the fact that games can be capital-A Art, at their best: not because I'm an artist myself, and not because I develop games, but because I know a thing or two.

Roger Ebert says I'm wrong. Clive Barker says I'm right, but really, do I want to be on Clive Barker's team? Sigh.

There's an interesting op-ed in the NY Times today. It's nice to see someone else who's critical of Halo 3, and asking: isn't there more?

I once interviewed Will Wright, the creator of the Sims, and he lamented how so many game aspire to be like films. Games should games, and exploit the stuff like play experience and interactivity that only this medium can. Spore, his next game, will surely do this. And I'm excited about small but wildly innovative titles like LittleBigPlanet and Echochrome. Think about Guitar Hero and Rock Band - those games are as far from "cinematic" as they can be - and that's a good thing.

More categories for this article than I thought possible... it's about everything.

Leigh Alexander is very much worth reading, when you're in search of thoughts on the game industry. Two recent articles are the case For and the case Against this new world of entertainment media convergence. Is this intertwining of games, web, movies, television, cell phones, GPS, fresh baked bread, and the fat pipe connecting your checking account to media producers' coffers, is this good for games?

Leigh gives the definitive maybe. I mostly agree.

So my hand is sort of cramped up from playing Guitar Hero: On Tour for the DS, and it just got me thinking about the world of input devices, and how this is really a new golden age of interesting ways of interacting with games.