[arg_discuss] Re: Communities and resources

[adam]

Michael Monello wrote:

> On Apr 8, 2006, at 11:48 AM, adam wrote:
> 
>> Films, computer games etc you pay for up-front. Although a small  
>> percentage additionally have subscription models for ongoing play,  
>> the vast majority are still pay-once, suck-it-and-see.
>>
>> Hence there is a huge need for reviews for the benefit of the  general 
>> public who are not *allowed* to try before they buy.
>>
>> ARGs do not currently use this business model, hence it seems there  
>> is comparitively little need for reviews (and even less so for  
>> previews). I'm not saying there is no value, just that it is orders  
>> of magnitude less than for other media.
> 
> 
> I disagree. As Brooke noted, you used a pre-game for Perplex City to  

How is that a review, or a preview?

Aren't a pre-game teaser (produced by the game owner) and a review 
(produced by an independent 3rd party) fundamentally different?

> great effect. Whether the audience has to buy a ticket up front or  
> watches it free on TV, or plays it in front of their computer, the  net 
> goal is always the same -- butts in seats. We're all going after  
> eyeballs here.

I should have been clearer, but I was looking at it from the non-PM 
perspective, thinking about how valuable a review will be to a player, 
how relevant, and how necessary. Mainstream games care about reviews 
because the reviews exist because the players need them. If the players 
dont need them, they wont pay much attention to them, causing them to 
have little value to the game developers (as you say yourself - we're 
all going after the eyeballs; if reviews aren't read much, we're not 
that interested (commercially), although we still care artistically).

> 
>>
>> Films, games, etc are also identical experiences whether or not  
>> anyone else has ever experienced them.
> 
> 
> Having sat through countless screenings of films I've been involved  
> with all over the world I can tell you that's not true. The  experience 
> of going to a cinema changes completely based on who is in  the theater, 
> how many are in the theater, etc. That's why studios  don't like to 

The experience, yes.

But .. the film itself?

Could [insert favourite movie here] become a "bad" movie if you saw it 
in bad circumstances, or does the art itself transcend the environment 
in which you view it?

> And games are completely different based on who you are playing with.  
> Even single player games are different depending on environment,  mood, 
> etc.

Yet they remain, at a low level, the same. There are fringe benefits to 
playing, say, Resident Evil alone, at night, in a darkened room in an 
empty house. But the game is still able to scare the living daylights 
out of you even played in the afternoon on a sunny day with 
neighbourhood noise going on outside.

> 
>> OTOH, as Wendy points out, ARGs are "ultimately a collaborative  form 
>> of entertainment", and the experience is heavily dependent  upon the 
 >> ...
>> How much value is there in a review of a non-deterministic experience?
> 
> 
> I think there can be huge value in it. On Audi we weren't sure  exactly 
> which cities we were going to do live events in, but we knew  we were 
> going to hit both coasts and at least one major metropolis in  between. 
> We knew we had the easter eggs, we knew people were going to  go on 
> missions with the characters, we knew which forms of media we  were 
> using to tell the story, etc. While so much was changed during  play I 

How much of that would you be comfortable revealing in the text of a review?

> Again, I'm not suggesting reviews up front -- that would have been  
> impossible for us to do on Adie, certainly, but feature stories are  
> what makes the entertainment world go round.

:)