[HN Gopher] There Are Too Many Video Games
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There Are Too Many Video Games
Author : Zanni
Score : 24 points
Date : 2022-02-02 22:23 UTC (36 minutes ago)
(HTM) web link (bottomfeeder.substack.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (bottomfeeder.substack.com)
| trixie_ wrote:
| People say all the time, "why spend all that money on space when
| there's so many problems on Earth?"
|
| Why do people never say the same thing about all the money spent
| on video games and Starbucks? Which is arguably a lot more money.
| rlayton2 wrote:
| Those might be the same people who say "why do you do research
| in field X, rather than on cancer research?". Why do you have a
| job as an admin rather than go back to school and become a
| cancer scientist?
|
| It's easier to criticize the actions of others than to take
| responsibility.
| kiba wrote:
| Space colonization is simply jumping third or fourth steps
| removed from the dream of making our Earth more livable and
| more ecologically diverse, or learning how to build and make an
| acrology.
|
| From that perspective, it's no wonder why people think it's a
| waste of space, because they saw no meaningful purpose.
| Meanwhile, we're doing the opposite of terraforming Earth, by
| making it more unlivable everyday.
| ModernMech wrote:
| This post gets weirder and weirder as it goes on. It seems to end
| up at a place suggesting that society is going to crumble around
| us as everyone spends their time making and playing indie video
| games. I think that's a little sensational, to say the least.
|
| Here is the central thesis. There's a lot to get through before
| you get to this. Writing a game nobody plays
| discharges your energy and creates the feeling of achievement,
| but it's all empty calories and then your car falls into a
| sinkhole. If your game succeeds, it's even worse. Your customers
| are now also expending all of their energy too, playing your game
| alone in a room. Meanwhile, sinkholes. THAT is why I
| say there are too many indie games. They aren't sustainable.
| There is too much time wasted, and that will be true until time
| is applied to making the world work and bridges not fall down and
| food be in stores. Probably your time.
| solarmist wrote:
| I think it's a bit more than just that, but yeah, it's not very
| well defined or detailed. A bit of a jobs version of everyone
| wants to be an influencer on social media, but it's making
| everyone lonelier.
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30185251
| kiba wrote:
| It's crumbling around us in part because we decided to
| overspend on infrastructure we don't need for one of the most
| inefficient form of transportation.
|
| Instead of improving things we already have, we decided to move
| to the 'frontier', or worse, demolish perfectly good streets.
| sorry_outta_gas wrote:
| yeah, I don't know about that, my indie game phase was
| fundamental to my carrer in 'hard' science.
|
| computers are great creative outlets for selfexpression toying
| around with games isn't a bad thing
|
| the shoe making thing is a bit odd because for a lot of people
| it's a similar creative outlet
| solarmist wrote:
| I feel like his point is that we've put creators, of all forms of
| media, on such a high pedestal that we're neglecting the mundane
| things that keep life running smoothly.
|
| I guess it's a job/career version of "social media is making us
| all lonelier." Everyone wants to be a creator like everyone wants
| to be an influencer...
|
| Okay, sure, but why are we doing that? I feel like it's something
| more fundamental that's gone off the rails. This is a form of
| society-wide coping mechanism until we can identify and try out
| solutions to whatever that fundamental issue is.
| dvt wrote:
| > This is a whole another blog post, so I'll paint with broad
| strokes for now. My city, Seattle, is crumbling. We don't have
| the energy to maintain the roads, and our bridges are literally
| falling apart. We can't even maintain what our grandparents
| built, let alone make any grand new projects.
|
| What in the world does this have to do with people creating art?
| Maybe the crumbling infrastructure is emblematic of poor
| leadership (N.B. we aren't allowed to blame Democrats for running
| Seattle into the ground in tech circles), corrupt politicians,
| poor city planning, etc.
|
| I get it, let's blame the musicians (what?)! The point is
| genuinely completely devoid of any through-line.
|
| > The reason a young, enterprising indie dev can churn out
| product is because that person is surrounded by cheap products
| made overseas in punishing conditions by people we never see.
| These are the delicious fruits of Empire.
|
| What a "college freshman" take on things, I wouldn't even know
| where to start.
| ModernMech wrote:
| I really think this post is best read as the author trying to
| convince himself that he should abandon his own indie video
| game project.
| micromacrofoot wrote:
| I mean if you want to point at anything for blame... at least
| point at government spending. More than half of federal
| discretionary spending is on the military. Put a few % of that
| towards infrastructure...
|
| For reference .003% of the federal budget goes towards the
| national endowment for the arts'
| [deleted]
| Mikeb85 wrote:
| Imagine saying there's too much culture...
|
| This just strikes me as an incoherent rant from someone whose
| games obviously don't sell. IMO you can never have too much
| music, books, recipes, or games. Culture is important and as we
| get closer to a post-scarcity world people will expend less
| effort on survival and more on art and culture. Or space travel
| and technology that we don't _need_ (but which we have to create
| because humans are curious).
| IndexCardBox wrote:
| Or maybe just the barriers to entry have significantly fallen. I
| remember making stupid games on my C64 back in the day, the
| difference was I didn't have a way to get it to people beyond my
| immediate family and friends.
|
| Couple low barriers to distribution with a culture that
| encourages constant hustling for money and this is what you get.
| derfnugget wrote:
| Seems like you're burnt out and you're trying to burn out
| everyone else as well. I create games in my free time for fun. I
| enjoy it. I have a game on Steam. It's not great but it's not
| nothing. And it's mine. Negative energy is what will make the
| world crumble, and this is a blog post full of negative energy.
| aeternum wrote:
| "So many (too many) books are published every year, and it seems
| everyone is writing a book. Perhaps we should all be reading more
| and writing less!" -- Tracy Chevalier
| pkaye wrote:
| That is where universal basic income comes in place so everyone
| can work on the fun stuff they want to work on.
| smashem wrote:
| Sounds like an interesting theory. Who will be the ones that do
| the productive work that pays for UBI?
| shmerl wrote:
| Interestingly while there are more games, I kind of played less
| games on average in the past year. Plus I already have a big
| backlog of games to play so I haven't bought much either.
| myhf wrote:
| i want shorter games with worse graphics made by people who are
| paid more to work less and i'm not kidding
| friedturkey wrote:
| Odd to focus on games when Seattle is propped up by a tech
| industry with people being overpaid by hundreds of thousands to
| make useless apps and websites.
|
| Indie game devs are usually making things at home during their
| downtime. As far as I know, there's no volunteer hobbyist bridge
| repair club, so they're not really taking away from anything.
| Meanwhile you have companies that have an easily replaceable
| service like Slack selling for nearly 30 billion dollars. That's
| what's swallowing up money and consuming the time of people who'd
| otherwise be making something useful.
| blinks wrote:
| Imagine making this same point about books:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Books_published_per_country_pe...
| mudita wrote:
| The point has been made about books before, see, e.g. gwern:
| https://www.gwern.net/Culture-is-not-about-Esthetics
| hashmal wrote:
| Or about movies! Although, to be fair, a similar mindset creeps
| in that field too: it ceases to be art, or moving stories, or
| mind-changing ideas from movie makers. Now it's all about
| _content_ , and how much it is _consumed_.
|
| I don't have data or facts to share, but I have a strong gut
| feeling that people who consider art (in a very broad meaning,
| including entertainment, games, music, etc) to be a commodity
| are not only missing out, they make the world a worst place to
| live in.
| pessimizer wrote:
| It's been done. There are too many books.
| solarmist wrote:
| He does.
|
| Later in his post, he generalized to all media but keeps the
| details video game specific.
|
| Basically, I feel like his point is that we've put creators, of
| all forms of media, on such a high pedestal that we're
| neglecting the mundane things that keep life running smoothly.
|
| Basically, a job/career version of social media making us all
| lonelier, I guess. Everyone wants to be a creator like everyone
| wants to be an influencer...
| dvt wrote:
| He does.
|
| > Spotify now gets over 60000 new songs a day. Amazon now has
| millions of books. My country has over 550 scripted TV shows in
| production.
|
| It's a weird point to make, and not really supported properly.
| [deleted]
| pessimizer wrote:
| > Art is what we teach our kids is the most valuable thing. The
| Disney movie Coco is about a boy from a family of shoemakers who
| wants to blow them off and be a musician. Disney will never, ever
| make a movie about a musician who dreams of making shoes. Even
| though, well, try going a week without music and then a week
| without shoes and see which is more necessary.
| claudiulodro wrote:
| Without shoes, the soles of your feet will eventually harden.
| Without art, your soul will eventually harden.
| musicale wrote:
| 1. If I'm working at home I spend more time listening to music
| than I do wearing shoes.
|
| 2. Making shoes these days means working in a sweatshop
| somewhere, which isn't an appealing dream.
|
| 3. Disney makes more money from soundtracks than from shoes, so
| you can see which one they might want to promote.
|
| 4. Musicals are a popular animated film genre; shoe-icals, not
| so much.
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