Everyone's A Critic

[StephenArdrey]

We live in strange days. One day, somebody could be making a goofy video in their basement. The next day, they are a name among name with gamer's and their views are to be totally trusted. I have always had a theory about critics.

Those who can't, rag on other people's shit. It's a really simple principal and has been around since the dawn of time. One caveman figured out how to draw boobs on a stick figure, another caveman bitched about it's lack of realism and direction. I do it myself at times but I really try to keep my views on art to myself.

I can only speak to what it is I like. I know what I wanted to see out of a piece of art and sometimes, it just doesn't do it for me. It doesn't trip that trigger internally like it should. That being said, why would I want to stop others from enjoying something even if I can't?

I really don't like to piss on people's parades. There are a lot of things that simply don't make me happy and I really try to avoid those things. I don't like group masterbation, so I stay away from cricle jerks. I despise yoga, except for the very beautiful women who do it in tight pants, so I don't participate in yoga classes.

At any point in time, you can see over 10,000 video reviews of any one game. YouTube, has given people infinite access to what other people think about one subject. I just never developed that desire to tell people what they should or shouldn't do.

Well, there is an exception to that. I tell people they should make up their own minds about any subject. Further more, I try my best to really stress that. At the sametime, I share my opinions and views on just about everything but I do it in a written form. So why do critics piss me off?

I think they don't ever think about what more could be done with the medium. I know LP's and rants are a part of the culture but how necessary are they? I am unsure and I am even unsure about criticism.

Any programmer, writer, artist, musician, or director would tell you,"I am my harshest critic."

That's because creators live and die by everthing they do. It's not the kind of death that ends either. It grows and burns. Soon it consumes everything you do to the point where you are second guessing basic decisions. It's all a twist of perspective.

We are driven by the need to create perfection for those who care to venture into our creation. It's really easy to be a critic. You say yes, no, maybe, or it fucking blows and moves on with your life. Creators, have to live with the creations they have birthed. Even when they turn into the bastard children they hate.

[RedGhostFrog]

Agreed. But I feel the need to say I'm prefectly fine with people saying what they think about X or Y, games included. Free speech is free speech. Yes, some people have shit taste when it comes to games (and other aspects of their lives), but then again some devs make shitty decisions and have weird psychedelic ideas.

Though, if, as you have pointed out several times, we are to consider games a form of art, then we will have to take the artist's attitude and kindly tell people who claim to hate your work to go fuck themselves. Okay, maybe doing that literally is a bad idea, but the point is, if you decide to make something, and not just to appeal to the masses and give you lots of sales but to express whatever artist are expressing with their art nowadays, you have to defend your work and probably give the "beauty is relative" argument and let it go. Because as you said that creation of yours is a part of you and if you are okay with how it turned out then probably that's all that matters.

But, if you are making a product to be sold, you need to care about your critics. Because if your game sucks ass and someone lets the world know it's not worth anyone's money, you're pretty much screwed.

P.S. glad to see you're back

[Heather]

No group masturbation? At least I know who NOT to invite to my parties!!  Hehe 

[StephenArdrey]

Agreed. But I feel the need to say I'm prefectly fine with people saying what they think about X or Y, games included. Free speech is free speech. Yes, some people have shit taste when it comes to games (and other aspects of their lives), but then again some devs make shitty decisions and have weird psychedelic ideas.

Though, if, as you have pointed out several times, we are to consider games a form of art, then we will have to take the artist's attitude and kindly tell people who claim to hate your work to go fuck themselves. Okay, maybe doing that literally is a bad idea, but the point is, if you decide to make something, and not just to appeal to the masses and give you lots of sales but to express whatever artist are expressing with their art nowadays, you have to defend your work and probably give the "beauty is relative" argument and let it go. Because as you said that creation of yours is a part of you and if you are okay with how it turned out then probably that's all that matters.

But, if you are making a product to be sold, you need to care about your critics. Because if your game sucks ass and someone lets the world know it's not worth anyone's money, you're pretty much screwed.

P.S. glad to see you're back

I believe you are correct. I am also trying to undertake a major project as well and I always look at what might be as compared to what will be. I know in my head it will be something of Oscar consideration, but what actually comes of it might be something else. I think some people forget about development hell sometimes.

People bitched about Duke Nukem Forever and it's many prolonged release dates. Then they bitched when it came out and it wasn't what they were expecting it to be. That being said, I love the freedom of speech but sometimes it would be nice for people to slip into the shoes of a creator for just one day.

I had a great idea for a project. I was going to use images from 8-bit games, run them through a program I have, and create sounds. Then I was going to recompose the the soundtrack to the game out of these sounds and make a movie showing what it looks like through a spectrogram. This was a lofty ambition but I think this is something that a gamer with some musical talent could do.

I also think it would be different than an LP and really bring out creativity without always doing the same thing. It's part of the reason why I like some of the Urban Myth's about Pokemon and Majora's Mask. You can tell that whoever wrote BEN Drowned hated Majora's Mask but did it in a different way.

That being said, there is a lot a person can do with a review or with their love of a game without Fanboy ranting. I just wish I could see a little more of that and a little less of the ordinary bitching.

[StephenArdrey]

No group masturbation? At least I know who NOT to invite to my parties!!  Hehe 

Well, specifically circle jerks, and you have to give me some warm up time for stage fright.

[badgirl_696969]

i try and stay away from people that rag on other peoples pride and not hurt peoples feelings. as for the circle jerks idk wat to say lmao thats kinda funny is all i can say

[The_YongGrand]

I had a great idea for a project. I was going to use images from 8-bit games, run them through a program I have, and create sounds. Then I was going to recompose the the soundtrack to the game out of these sounds and make a movie showing what it looks like through a spectrogram. This was a lofty ambition but I think this is something that a gamer with some musical talent could do.

I do not know why 8-bit games amazed me. Being a late-comer for this 8-bit arena (because back in the 90s, many people in SE Asia are too poor to own even a 386 computer), I was exposed much to the NES games. I had that 8-bit console clone called "Micro Genius", and with a catridge of 24 games. Plus, these games are fun to play despite the limited graphics and stuff. The best thing about the 8-bit games the developers created is their own creativity - they exploited the limitations of the hardware to do wonderful stuff on it. I always wondered how they wrote games into it and stuff. The beeps, boops, zzzziiiing and pzzzhs are fun to listen too.

Due to such awesome flashbacks, I decided to probably, probably make an emulator for the Atari 2600 first (or the Apple 2) before I embark the journey to a more complicated system. The emulation will not be done on a PC - it'll be on a 32-bit microprocessor, and all the hardware inside will be analyzed and probed in the datasheet before I write it in the software.

It may be an art too, but it deserves a seperate topic about 8-bit world and homebrew computing.

Those who can't, rag on other people's shit. It's a really simple principal and has been around since the dawn of time. One caveman figured out how to draw boobs on a stick figure, another caveman bitched about it's lack of realism and direction. I do it myself at times but I really try to keep my views on art to myself.

When we were kids, we started critisizing unneccessarily. But when we grow older, we back it up with sources and opinions, or think twice before we said a word because our prefrontal cortex are much more developed.