On Subjectivity (Destiny)

by RaichuKFM , Northeastern Ohio, Thursday, January 15, 2015, 18:24 (3401 days ago) @ Cody Miller

I would say that isn't what a game is.

I would say it's an interactive vehicle intended to lead to gratification of some kind. I'd imagine that gratification is generally enjoyment.

Games don't have to be immersive; many are. They don't have to seek a pinnacle experience; many are mediocre and fully aware of it.

I don't need to study art history because you are wrong on the very face of it.

On a tangent, one should gauge a game's quality on what it delivers, how it delivers it, and the variation (or lack thereof) throughout the game.

But because one of the ways you gauge a game is by the reaction it elicits, it means that a game's quality is, in part, subjective. So you can't just objectively state "This game is better than that one"; you just can't. So you can't say that Super Meat Boy is pointless because there's better or more influential games in existence; it's a game that plenty of people enjoy. That in itself justifies its existence. That's what it's doing for the medium.

It's existing, and being good. Hell, even if a game is just a big "okay", then that's fine. Someone out there will enjoy it. It isn't hurting the industry just because it isn't doing anything in and of itself to significantly help it. Because most games aren't incredibly innovative or commonly agreed upon to be the pinnacle of a genre or anything. But if none of them existed, the industry would suffer. Good, but not particularly remarkable games have to exist. Something has to be the bulk that makes up most of a type of artwork. The idea that they all have to be striving for the pinnacle is snobbish. Does every book have to aim to be the best in its genre? Should they even, when that is quite clearly not going to happen for most of them? Should someone who feels they can't write a better fantasy story than the Lord of the Rings just not write fantasy?

Should I stop playing Dungeons & Dragons because I can imagine someone could run a campaign or play a character better than I?

Have I done enough reductio ad absurdum via rhetorical questions yet?