site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of September 12, 2022

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.

40
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

I think a big effect that happened over the last 10-20 years is that niche, "nerdy" media like video games have become more mainstream and thus reviewers are targeting a different demographic. No longer are they targeting weird, mostly male nerds, but more like Joe Average, which means their content is less useful to people like me. That also explains why I find most modern AAA games boring and why I still find useful information from people and creators who are more like me.

I really notice that when playing older games from the "golden age" of PC gaming in the late 90s to mid 2000s; they are often more mechanically complex and have much more complex plots than modern titles, simply because that is something players appreciated at the time and appreciate less now.

So yeah, I think it's mostly demographic shifts in who consumes this kind of media which drive this.

I really notice that when playing older games from the "golden age" of PC gaming in the late 90s to mid 2000s; they are often more mechanically complex and have much more complex plots than modern titles, simply because that is something players appreciated at the time and appreciate less now.

What games are you playing these days? I've noticed the polar opposite, that games are getting far more complex and intricate today. I can't name a single game released >20 years ago that reaches the complexity of modern EU4, and even mainstream games like Destiny 2 have way more build variety and moving parts than shooters back in the 90s or early 2000s.

"Forever games" can reach an unbelievable level of complexity, and they didn't exist (EDIT: as much) in the 90s. MOBAs, MMORPGs, arena shooters, strategy games, heck even Minecraft.

I think today's forever games are less engaging, though, because people engage with their complexity mostly by learning "the meta" that someone else discovered by rote. The standard advice given to HOI4 newbies is to watch five hours of tutorial videos that teach you how division templates and combat calculations work. In the 90s you would dive into a game and parse it for yourself.

I think today's forever games are less engaging, though, because people engage with their complexity mostly by learning "the meta" that someone else discovered by rote. The standard advice given to HOI4 newbies is to watch five hours of tutorial videos that teach you how division templates and combat calculations work. In the 90s you would dive into a game and parse it for yourself.

It's true that it's basically impossible to have secrets in video games in the age of the Internet. People claimed up and down that Sonic was a playable character in Smash Bros Melee, and the rumor persisted for years, but in these days it would never gain traction. Similarly, easter eggs for most games are thoroughly well-documented to the point where if you want to know the secrets of a major game, it's typically just a Google search away. However, this applies to playing old games in the present day as well, as their secrets are just as exposed to the Internet as the secrets of modern games are.

My point is that modern forever games are so complex that it's implausible or at least unpleasant to learn to play them on your own. A late 90s game like, oh, Fallout or Morrowind for example, you can have a pleasant time muddling through the middling level of complexity and mastering it on your own. This learning process was what I really loved.

Modern games are like making a choice between doing a worksheet of fifth grade math problems with fancy graphics OR going through the Khan Academy course for multivariable calculus with a tutor giving you formulas to memorize.

The Internet has effectively outsourced tutorials for some games. Some of this is a natural progression of some games being so complex that watching a Let's Play is the most efficient way of learning. On the other hand, some of this is just lazy devs knowing fanmade wikis will document enough stuff that they think tutorials are a waste of time.

That said, I disagree on the characterization of modern gaming being a dichotomy of ruthless complexity vs braindead simplicity. There's plenty of games in the middleground. The Total War games are one example. Slay the Spire is another. Terraria is yet another, although it's certainly an offender of the "outsource the tutorial to the wiki" phenomenon.

sure, but none of the games you listed are "forever games", I don't think. Have you played Path of Exile, or Warframe?

I've beaten PoE twice (with years in between), and never needed to look things up. If you're just getting to the level cap and the end of the story, then you don't need a hyperoptimized build.

"beaten poe" is a pretty ambiguous phrase. the level cap is 100, and I've never gotten anywhere near it, even with fairly optimized builds. The end of the story is certainly not anything terribly hard to hit, but I'd call that the beginning of the game, not the end. The end is t16 maps and the uber bosses, and you need serious gear and a coherent build or you just run out of gas in, at best, early yellows.

More comments