depending who you ask, even the greatest art is considered boring by many, many people. Art is boring if you do not invest in it. Mathematics is boring if you do not invest in it, if you do not try to learn and understand it. Once you have done your investment, you will find that Mathematics is quite interesting. If someone says to me: your game is boring, I feel the urge to reply, "No, you are boring!"

The best thing I like about the Uncharted series is that they do not have loading screens. It feels a bit like magic. And they made really great looking games, where you think they have to shift a huge amount of data... but they hide the loading/streaming extremly well. So they make a pretty seamless experience on a technical level.

I played about 2/3 of LA Noire... The problem with cinematic games like LA Noire and UC is that you know their roots in movie history, their cinematic models. And then it is inevitable that you draw a comparison between the game and its source material... and then I realized how weak the storytelling is in comparison. They feel very much like copies, they don't feel original at all... it is like watching Chinatown and then The Two Jakes side by side. (although Chinatown was already a hommage to the noire genre).

It is like they want to make a good movie and a good videogame at the same time in one package. And as far as I understand it from an outsider perspective, making a good or even great movie takes a lot of effort and talent. It is like writing a great novel and a great symphony at the same time... I don't know if that is even possible (or if it even makes sense)...

depends on how you define challenge. A Picasso can be very challenging. Being good and fast at pressing buttons at the right time is challenging, but I want to be challenged in the Picasso-way.

Did anyone play El Shaddai? It looks like it could be an interesting aesthetic experience... don't know if they go deep in developing their themes though. I think I will check it out...

Also I finished Uncharted 3. I usually never finish games, but UC games are made to be finished (it helps that I play on easy). I am really disappointed of UC3. They have great setpieces, but they don't have a story. They introduce villains, but they don't do anything with them. They are the mostly uninteresting. You can't have a great action movie without a great villain (a quote from Hitchcock on his movies).

Also the part in the dessert is an intense experience, (could be inspired by The Path), but it does not go very deep. Mild spoiler ahead. After Drake was surving the dessert for 2 days and 2 nights, he reaches a village. No water. He is almost dead. So that felt really intense. But what happens next? Shootout after Shootout... it is totally negating the last 30 minutes of game. He moves and shoots like he never was in the dessert for 2 days without water. It is ridiculous and sad.

Remember when Lawrence of Arabia crossed the dessert... imagine after he was returning half-dead, that he was having a shoutout with faceless enemies... it would be so dumb.

They could have made it a more convincing experience. Let him search for water, let him find some water, let him rest a bit, let Drake think about how he ended here, and then start the shootout... but they don't take their time to develop situations or characters. So you get a Raiders-Of-The-Lost-Ark-lookalike but never ever reaching the qualitiy of Raiders. At any point.

I liked the Heavy Rain tech and game system, it did feel right. I almost never finish any game, but this I did...
Unfortunately it was such a dumb, boring and dumb story. It was such an uninteresting killer story like you can have this kind of story on TV 5 times a week in less than 2 hours.

There was this prequel DLC of Heavy Rain which I thought was better than the main game. You were exploring this house, and it was the most thrilling experience in a game I had for a long time. It was intense. There was almost know story, but a very thoughtful crafted situation.

Someone should buy the tech behind Heavy Rain from Mr. Cage and do something interesting with it...

Tell me what you play and I tell you who you are...

I play too many mainstream games, unfortunately not enough indie stuff...

The Binding Of Isaac. It is a roguelike with a weird setting. I love roguelikes, because they create their own story with each playthrough (almost).

Dark Souls. The atmosphere is very sinister. I like it that the game does not use any cutscenes and very little dialog. This game is like a dream or a nightmare. it has it's own logic. I love to be in that world even though it kills me every time... otherwise it is very gamey, too. But whatever, I am lost in that world... it is killing my productivity, too

The Cat and the Coup. I liked it very much, also that it has a very political theme. More politics into games. I am all for it...

Not to forget my Trackmania 2 addiction*





* although I play all those mainstream games, I want to create very, very different and exclusive stuff. The computer is too great a tool, to only create what are basically toys

So now you know who I am or not Share your games or not games...

I once compared making a videogame to painting. It is the same like painting, where you use a telephone to give instructions to a remote painter to execute the painting.

I was experimenting with Multimedia Fusion 2 and Game Factory 2 for the last 2 weeks (the demo versions). The Tutorial is pretty good, and MMF2 even has an iOS device exporter (for iphone, ipod etc)...

http://www.clickteam.com/eng/mmf2.php


it is kind of a visual development tool, so you do not program in the traditional way... for 2D projects it is not bad at all...

it is a bit narcisstic, if you think about it. Everything is about you, maybe that's the appeal for many gamers.

I think, I am on the complete other side of the spectrum. I am growing the feeling that too many games are too ego-centric for their own good. I mean, that everything and the whole virtual world revolves around the player. I don't want to do that. I find it boring. The player needs to realize that he is a part of this world, but that he is not necessarily the most important part in the world. I suppose I tried to convey this point in Labyrinths (although it was not intended in the first place, this idea sneaked into it and became rather dominant).

thanks, he is very, very entertaining

I was thinking along those lines, that interactivity is a form of communication or conversation, a 2 way conversation... That's what I try to do. To communicate with the user of my software.

While watching the Tulse Luper Suitcases, every time when Tulse Luper receives a beating a number count is popping out of his body. Is Greenaway mocking RPG or videogame clichees? Also Eric van Hoyten is appearing, the belgian stationmaster.

here is the link

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-MLKg7FJLk

although some people think that film is a passive medium I believe, that especially Greenaways films are highly "interactive". It certainly feels that way... The interactive part is between your eyes and the screen. You decide where to look at, and there is so much going on that you can't see everything at once. So you are interacting with the screen, I would say.

somehow this article makes me angry or annoyed. I think, what annoys me most is that there are no rules in making art (that's my opinion). And that article is heavy on making assumptions and rules, about what is important and what not.

like this statement

So is the sensation of a plan falling apart, or a plan resulting in a very different state than you expected, or a plan hastily thrown together working against all odds. None of these experiences has any equivalent in other media.

That happens all the time in any Victor Hugo novel. Also I would recommend to watch some good movies like Smoking/No Smoking or Last Year at Marienbad...

or this

At the end of the day, though, generating and executing plans is the most visceral experience of playing a game

At the end of the day an apple might fall down from a tree. That's important in my opinion

it's not running on an ipod touch, right?

btw. what development tools were you using for it (if it is not top secret)...?

I did think of AAA sequels, too. But I don't think that's what Thomas was going for. But you could make the point, that AAA studios are smart in that they do not start from scratch with every new project.

sometimes it is really important to itereate, if you want to go deep.