There’s definitely an arms race - if it’s cheaper to pay an SEO to get your pages shown, then you pay the SEO; if it’s cheaper to pay Google advertising, then you pay to play. I’m sure Google is constantly tweaking their algorithm to filter SEO techniques to get better, authentic results, but it seems like a losing battle at this point.

human nature remembers negative experiences much better than positive, so it only takes like 5% assholes before it feels like everyone is toxic.

I would not be surprised if this is an experiment to see the effect of killing API on the event. I mean, really, not many accounts have left reddit (a lot have showed up on lemmy/kbin, but a small fraction of reddit), and I remember a lot of complaints of bots in the last place. It’s just 3 months since the last one, so they should get great data on the effect of API charges on their bot access.

BBQ

babyque?

Also love this post, but I can’t help noting the irony of a thread begging people to ‘sell’ a product on a platform that famously opposes advertising. In fact, thinking about it, there are a lot of “what are you playing now,” “what should I play next,” “what’s your favorite…” threads on most of the gaming c/'s I’ve seen. Like, in the absence of advertising, people are just begging to be told what’s new, exciting, and available, as though it’s more meaningful coming from a pseudonymous internet stranger than a declared corporate minion. Real opinions or astroturf? Who’s to say.

“Awesome story” is always going to imply “for its medium.” You’d never compare the story in “The Strawberry Roan” to “The Telltale Heart,” or Telltale to “David Copperfield.” There’s a story painted on the Sistine Chapel, but it’s character development is abominable compared with “Pride and Prejudice.”

You can’t tell a story in a game without the player’s participation. If the game has a plot, the writers have to force the player into actions that advance the plot. If the game has character development, the character may have to make choices the player wouldn’t. OP’s right that games do have more tendency to rely on ex machina solutions, or have narrative/character inconsistencies. I mean, how many times will you gleefully murder legions of minions, only to have an agonizing dialog over whether to spare their super-villain overlord? But people like the mechanic of going full murder hobo, and you’ve got to balance fun mechanics with philosophical interludes. Or vice versa.

The alternative is a completely freeform simulation, where every NPC has some scripted responses to every possible player action. That’s two complete stories based on whether the player chooses not/to murder his boss’s boss, another where he agrees to, but then betrays his boss instead… And what if he overthrows the assassin lord after/before he meets the mages’ guild? That kind of ‘choices matter’ game has been a dream as long as RPGs have been around, and you just can’t do it. It’s what sets tabletop RPGs apart from computers.

This only gets worse as you move up the org chart and the duties & skills become more nebulous. If your job has “mentoring” rather than “training,” then it’s really hard to build skills remotely.

It’s almost like luck and nepotism are more important for success than ability.

I think it comes down to whether a game’s mechanics are satisfying and whether the game is open enough to continue. Sandbox games like Stardew or NMS you can fire up, tend your machines or crops for an hour or so, and stop, like watching a rerun of your favorite show. Skyrim isn’t technically a sandbox, but similar, you can jump in, run a couple dungeons or repeating quests, and it’s just nice. No new controls or mechanics to learn, no wishing I had better gear. Like noodle soup on a cold day.

Skyrim’s been out for 12 years. 250 hours isn’t even a half hour a week. Not even 2 hours a month. Stardew Valley is 7 years old. 250 hours is barely 45 minutes a week. It really doesn’t take that much to rack up some serious hours.