Gone Home from The Fullbright Company

[bkbroiler]

I always close every door behind me to section myself off from the rest of the house to protect against ghosts

[Stuart]

There's only one kind of ghosts I fear...

 

The ghosts of my past.

 

#SeriousVideo GameCharacters

[chummer]

Another day, another opportunity for people to argue whether or not Gone Home is a game...

 

http://www.polygon.com/2014/3/31/5566098/gone-home-is-it-a-game

What gets me down about this is the aim of the article is 'let's put Gone Home on trial. How is it a game?' which is kind of... silly? I feel like a better article would be to examine what's up with gamers who can't accept Gone Home as something clearly born out of video games and is itself one.

 

 

Help me out here, am I remembering things wrong, or did people spend this much time arguing about Dear Esther's game-ness when it came out? I just remember people saying it was pretentious and boring, but I don't remember people getting into the game semantic argument so much. What gives? More press? Some sort of feature of the design? Planetary alignment emitting some sort of weird neural wave distortion field?

Bjorn mentioned the misogyny/homophobia and I also feel as if Gone Home got more press than Dear Esther did. Consequently it caused a bigger reaction. But yes, whenever I heard Dear Esther mentioned on podcasts around its release, it was almost always coupled with 'is it a game?' conversations.

[Architecture]

Gone Home stuck its landing in way that so very few video games ever do. I mean we're talking Portal-level storytelling here. I have argued with people about its validity as a game, which I think is patently absurd to argue.

 

Unlike with movies, music and literature, the thing that defines video games still remains, in some corners, a debated issue.

 

The thing about this is how absurd it sounds when given context. It's not as if Gone Home is so avant-garde that it bears no resemblance to what's come before. These other forms of media get a lot more leeway than games do.

[Gormongous]

The thing about this is how absurd it sounds when given context. It's not as if Gone Home is so avant-garde that it bears no resemblance to what's come before. These other forms of media get a lot more leeway than games do.

 

Your comment made me think. When Empire was filmed or Tristram Shandy was written, the people contesting them as films or novels were the old-guard critics, who were invested in preserving a status quo over which they were confirmed to be arbiters. That's sometimes the case with the people rejecting Gone Home as a game, but the criticisms are also coming from many younger and more avant-garde critics too, who are using the opportunity to hone their own self-made definitions of what a game is? Is it just the relative infancy of the medium that makes all walks of life willing to dissect Gone Home's inadequacies? Is it PoMo or something else in the culture at large?

[TychoCelchuuu]

What younger and more avant-garde critics? I've never seen any legit critics say that Gone Home isn't a game. The people leading the charge are just a bunch of dipshits on the Internet who are scared of gaming turning into something other than a refuge for misogynistic homophobic teenage boys to shoot each other and teabag each other and call each other faggot over and over. They hate "art" and games with a message and games that address issues that women or minorities have and games that aren't about killing and games that try something new and break from established, comfortable modes that they understand and enjoy because new things scare them.

[Gormongous]

What younger and more avant-garde critics? I've never seen any legit critics say that Gone Home isn't a game. The people leading the charge are just a bunch of dipshits on the Internet who are scared of gaming turning into something other than a refuge for misogynistic homophobic teenage boys to shoot each other and teabag each other and call each other faggot over and over. They hate "art" and games with a message and games that address issues that women or minorities have and games that aren't about killing and games that try something new and break from established, comfortable modes that they understand and enjoy because new things scare them.

 

I'm thinking the N'Gai Croal article, which definitely had some "Gone Home is not a (very good) game (mechanically)" in it. Beyond that, I can only conjure up a vague recollection of various reviewers and critics whom I acknowledge, if not respect, doing some "mechanically sparse" or "closer to a visual novel" soft-shoe, so maybe you've got me there. It's just given me the sense that a good chunk of the video gaming press has hedged their bets by having these "debate" bits, either on their own or in a review, that ostensibly score points on both sides of the issue, which wouldn't even be an issue if said press didn't feel beholden to reflect "popular" opinion to some degree.

[Merus]

There is certainly a view, which I hesitantly called the Kierkergaard view, that the most important element of a game is mechanical conflict. The game has to push back, or else it isn't responding to your actions.

 

I'm pretty sure that's bullshit but the strongest evidence I have is that by calling it the Kierkergaard view I may well have summoned his followers, who will come here and be dicks about anyone disagreeing with them.

[Stuart]

What younger and more avant-garde critics? I've never seen any legit critics say that Gone Home isn't a game. The people leading the charge are just a bunch of dipshits on the Internet who are scared of gaming turning into something other than a refuge for misogynistic homophobic teenage boys to shoot each other and teabag each other and call each other faggot over and over. They hate "art" and games with a message and games that address issues that women or minorities have and games that aren't about killing and games that try something new and break from established, comfortable modes that they understand and enjoy because new things scare them.

 

It's even worse when those same dipshits bring up that the game or games similar to it are shallow or lack credibility of some sort. The one that piss me off (though sometimes make me chuckle when I'm in the right mood) are the ones that say "X games is pretentious or shallow, and is not a game. If you want better entertainment, go read a book." Gross internet people love to pass themselves as being intellectual or above whatever they think they are "critiquing", and I fucking hate it.

 

I also fucking hate the term "Walking simulator" is a thing now. Even in a non-condescending context, it robs meaning and context from anything that focuses on minimalist mechanics and/or design. The word "simulator" implies something cold and mechanical that, well, simulates a certain action, or profession with mathematical accuracy. Gone Home isn't a "walking simulator". It's purpose isn't to fucking simulate how fucking legs work and contort to form the action of walking, its about learning and inhabiting a space rich with narrative and meaning. It's like saying a dramatic novel that goes into the details of the mundane life of a janitor is a handbook to janitor skills in the workplace. The term "Walking Simulator" needs to die, or at least someone should make an actual walking simulator so we can use it for something.

 

But yeah, fuck the internet.

[chummer]

 ...someone should make an actual walking simulator so we can use it for something.

 

QWOP?

[Stuart]

QWOP?

 

What's funny is that I had written that I don't agree that QWOP isn't a walking simulator, but decided to delete it since it wasn't relevant to this thread.

 

But yeah, no, I don't think that counts. I feel it all has to do with intentions and actual mechanical input. QWOP, despite giving you the power to control every limb on a person's leg, doesn't have the intention to literally simulate and systemize the act of walking. It's mechanics are there to create a challenge and is a source of humor when you fuck up. All about intention and execution.

[Bjorn]

There is certainly a view, which I hesitantly called the Kierkergaard view, that the most important element of a game is mechanical conflict. The game has to push back, or else it isn't responding to your actions.

 

I'm pretty sure that's bullshit but the strongest evidence I have is that by calling it the Kierkergaard view I may well have summoned his followers, who will come here and be dicks about anyone disagreeing with them.

 

If you write Kierkergaard three times in one post, is it like summoning Beetlejuice?

[Patrick R]

Are games art?

 

Well, you talk about them like art and they're expressive like art and they certainly contain a lot of art. But why does it matter if they fit a technical definition of art in the first place?

Is Gone Home a game?

 

Well you play it like a game and talk about it like a game and you solve puzzles in it like a game, and you get it from online retail spaces that sell games. But why does it matter if it fits the technical definition of a game in the first place?

 

Because Semantics Rule Everything Around Me, SREAM, get the money, dolla dolla bill, y'all.

Oh.
 

[TychoCelchuuu]

I'm thinking the N'Gai Croal article, which definitely had some "Gone Home is not a (very good) game (mechanically)" in it. Beyond that, I can only conjure up a vague recollection of various reviewers and critics whom I acknowledge, if not respect, doing some "mechanically sparse" or "closer to a visual novel" soft-shoe, so maybe you've got me there. It's just given me the sense that a good chunk of the video gaming press has hedged their bets by having these "debate" bits, either on their own or in a review, that ostensibly score points on both sides of the issue, which wouldn't even be an issue if said press didn't feel beholden to reflect "popular" opinion to some degree.

"Gone Home is not a (very good) game (mechanically)" is very different from "it's not a game." Mechanically I'm more or less lukewarm on the game - it doesn't do anything very wrong or very right, I'd say, apart from allowing you to flip around the empty cassette tape boxes, which is cool. I think the game is mechanically sparse and closer to a visual novel than some other games, and that it's worth talking about whether this is a good or bad thing for it and for games in general, but I've never seen anyone aside from dipshits claim that the game isn't actually a game. Nobody I respect has ever tried to exclude Gone Home from consideration as part of the medium by definitional fiat.

[sclpls]

Are games art?

 

Well, you talk about them like art and they're expressive like art and they certainly contain a lot of art. But why does it matter if they fit a technical definition of art in the first place?

Is Gone Home a game?

 

Well you play it like a game and talk about it like a game and you solve puzzles in it like a game, and you get it from online retail spaces that sell games. But why does it matter if it fits the technical definition of a game in the first place?

 

Because Semantics Rule Everything Around Me, SREAM, get the money, dolla dolla bill, y'all.

Oh.

 

 

Yeah, I prefer the philosophical lens of pragmatism for considering these types of things. i.e. Art is whatever appears in art galleries and museums, literature is whatever teachers of literature teach in class, etc. "Oh, you're running a program on a service you use to play video games on, and you're operating that program using a video game controller? It's probably a video game."

 

I was thinking about the idea of people saying Gone Home isn't a game, and whether or not that is a dog whistle. I definitely think there is something to that, it's an argument that allows people to express some frustration with the game without appearing outright barbarous.

[elmuerte]

I always close every door behind me to section myself off from the rest of the house to protect against ghosts

you are aware that ghost can go through doors and walls

[SecretAsianMan]

In fact you would be trapping yourself in the same room as the ghost.

[Bjorn]

In fact you would be trapping yourself in the same room as the ghost.

 

See Spelunky videos for examples of how to trap yourself in an enclosed area with a ghost. 

[SecretAsianMan]

See Spelunky videos for examples of how to trap yourself in an enclosed area with a ghost. 

 

Gone Home: it'll send a terrible chill down your spine

[Gormongous]

"Gone Home is not a (very good) game (mechanically)" is very different from "it's not a game." Mechanically I'm more or less lukewarm on the game - it doesn't do anything very wrong or very right, I'd say, apart from allowing you to flip around the empty cassette tape boxes, which is cool. I think the game is mechanically sparse and closer to a visual novel than some other games, and that it's worth talking about whether this is a good or bad thing for it and for games in general, but I've never seen anyone aside from dipshits claim that the game isn't actually a game. Nobody I respect has ever tried to exclude Gone Home from consideration as part of the medium by definitional fiat.

 

Fair enough. I see a continuum between the two positions, but maybe there isn't one. Certainly, definitional gatekeeping is sophistry and I wouldn't read a single word more of anyone I caught doing it outside of a textbook or something actually germane. 

[Dewar]

It's all a game.

 

LIFE is a game.

[Stuart]

It's all a game.

 

LIFE is a game.

 

[bkbroiler]

you are aware that ghost can go through doors and walls

Not if I systematically turn on every light in every room I enter and leave them on after leaving (closing the door of course). Then I just pick up every object that could trigger something while facing away from it, thus ensuring that nothing will spawn behind me.

 

This is real life I'm talking about though, not video games

[sclpls]

I feel like Far Cry 3 writer Jeffrey Yohalem must be trolling me

 

http://gamasutra.com/view/news/214696/QA_Smaller_is_better_for_Child_of_Light_writer_Jeffrey_Yohalem.php

[Ozzie]

Gone Home a Myst clone.

Ha. Haha. Mwahahahha!

 

Isn't Gone Home more like Minerva's Den without the shooting than Myst without the puzzling?

Besides both games being in first person and the story partly being told through scattered notes, I'm not sure the similarities amount too much?

Especially since the scattered notes/audiologs storytelling device has its roots also in games like System Shock.

 

I haven't played Gone Home yet, but I don't sense the legacy of Myst behind Gone Home, contrary to how I feel the legacy of Myst behind Ether One and The Witness.