This weekly roundup thread is intended for all culture war posts. 'Culture war' is vaguely defined, but it basically means controversial issues that fall along set tribal lines. Arguments over culture war issues generate a lot of heat and little light, and few deeply entrenched people ever change their minds. This thread is for voicing opinions and analyzing the state of the discussion while trying to optimize for light over heat.
Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time, and so is being nice! Pessimistically, there are many dynamics that can lead discussions on Culture War topics to become unproductive. There's a human tendency to divide along tribal lines, praising your ingroup and vilifying your outgroup - and if you think you find it easy to criticize your ingroup, then it may be that your outgroup is not who you think it is. Extremists with opposing positions can feed off each other, highlighting each other's worst points to justify their own angry rhetoric, which becomes in turn a new example of bad behavior for the other side to highlight.
We would like to avoid these negative dynamics. Accordingly, we ask that you do not use this thread for waging the Culture War. Examples of waging the Culture War:
-
Shaming.
-
Attempting to 'build consensus' or enforce ideological conformity.
-
Making sweeping generalizations to vilify a group you dislike.
-
Recruiting for a cause.
-
Posting links that could be summarized as 'Boo outgroup!' Basically, if your content is 'Can you believe what Those People did this week?' then you should either refrain from posting, or do some very patient work to contextualize and/or steel-man the relevant viewpoint.
In general, you should argue to understand, not to win. This thread is not territory to be claimed by one group or another; indeed, the aim is to have many different viewpoints represented here. Thus, we also ask that you follow some guidelines:
-
Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.
-
Be as precise and charitable as you can. Don't paraphrase unflatteringly.
-
Don't imply that someone said something they did not say, even if you think it follows from what they said.
-
Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.
On an ad hoc basis, the mods will try to compile a list of the best posts/comments from the previous week, posted in Quality Contribution threads and archived at /r/TheThread. You may nominate a comment for this list by clicking on 'report' at the bottom of the post and typing 'Actually a quality contribution' as the report reason.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
The single-player/co-op experience was pretty masterful, although I'm with the people who got too bogged down by the downer Flood levels to look forward to replaying it very much. I can't remember the specifics, but for the first playthrough and story-wise, the Flood were definitely a cool part though.
But in-person multiplayer Halo was crazy, just for how many more people it brought into gaming. I was loving broodwar and unreal tournament, and didn't fully get the appeal of PvP Halo 1 (other than the sticky grenades which were peak). But it was pretty awesome how galvanized people were to link up like 15 xboxes between a whole floor of college dorm rooms for it. Or working at a movie theater in the summer, having most of the employees show up at 1am to set up 3 xboxes and projectors to play on the giant screen. This kind of normie / less-smelly console version of LAN parties, where many girls actually found it cool, was a strange brief time (right before xbox live & online console gaming took off).
POV: we have master chief at home (CoD)
Wonder if it was due to achieving relatively strong balance for the weapons selection.
You had interesting and unique weapons for any given playstyle you prefer. Snipers at distance, middle-distance/jack of all trades assault rifles, shotgun for close range, and a decent variety of pistols that were actually impactful on their own and not just backup weapons. Sticky grenades, as mentioned.
And of course, the Gravity Hammer and Energy Sword.
And fun vehicular combat.
This was before online multiplayer games were dominated by "THE META" such that certain weapons just get binned as nonviable if everyone else is playing 'optimally.'
If you wanted to run around like a madman crushing skulls with a hammer, you went for it.
Yeah I think the strength was being quite well polished and minimal/tight, from long range all the way down to melee rifle-butt/pistol-whip. My main memory is how slick it felt jumping in to drive/ride the warthog around with the animations, 3rd-person camera transition, and acceleration physics (which is basically how it looks to this day in modern call of duty I think).
But around ~2002-2004, there was also just some level of mainstream social proof / accessibility / network-effect that had Halo punching way above its weight for how fun it actually was. The bros at parties would be playing it, similar to how poker next popped off and became huge from being on ESPN in 03-04. But when I'm back at home, I'm not firing up the xbox, I have way better stuff to play on the internet. Maybe if not UT or starcraft, I'm jumping back onto Tribes 2 with base-vs-base strategic capture-the-flag mode, with better variety maps, vehicles, weapons & class load-outs, and super skill-expression 'skiing' movement and spinfusor/mortar projectile shots. Ultimately the 'console peasant' snobbery wasn't wrong for quite some time.
Oh man, the warthog was such fun. Me and nephew managed to crash into everything, fall over every cliff, etc. until we figured out the optimum controls but it was so great that we didn't mind 😁
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link