Browsing around Gamasutra this morning and stumbled across this great Brandon Sheffield piece on game preservation and once again found myself wondering whether in ten years time, there’ll be a big black hole where this generation of games lies^[1].

I’ll freely admit to enjoying the benefits that this uber connected-always-on world brings us and brings to our gaming. It’s an incredible time to have our hobby with so many things going on right now but more than ever, I find myself thinking that with the race to push the game player further and further towards service based, we’re kinda fucking it up a bit for future generations.

We’re already fairly reliant on piracy for preservation because the software industry is especially volatile, studios open, studios close, studios get sold on, people move on, time and hardware move on at a rapid rate. Companies buy IP but care little about heritage and why should they? They exist to make money not to preserve culture as icky as that is to me. Sure, there’s some money to be made from it in reissues but the amount of games that would be deemed worth reissuing? Not many, methinks.

The measures the industry is taking currently to combat their personal devil slims the chances of these things being easily preserved even further. Of course, it’s not just anti-piracy measures as egregious as those can be, there’s the move towards multiplayer and removing dedicated servers from the equation, there’s reliance on online scoreboards, social networks, all sorts of integrated things where each and every layer makes preserving the experience of a game even more difficult. Every service games get tied to is one more point of failure, one more chance of a server shutdown or service closing taking the game with it. Imagine for a second if we’d tied our games to Friends Reunited or to MySpace…

It wouldn’t surprise me to be looking back in ten years time definitely thinking “man, there’s just a black hole where some of the things we created were”, y’know? “Remember all those games we used to play but now can’t?”

John Anderson talked about a fair few of the issues surrounding the matter in his Where Games Go To Sleep series and the follow up Selecting Save On The Games That We Make, The National Videogame Archive is a thing that exists and that’s a good thing although of course, there always remains the questions of not just how to preserve things but what also. I’m in favour of The Museum Of Computing’s attitude of “all of it” and obviously, if it doesn’t include Williams’ Blaster then it’s all for naught anyway but that’s by the by.

There’s another aspect of preservation though that I’ve been thinking about for quite a while and it’s something that everyone can help in.

As a clue, here’s RR regular @ToreSupra damning himself for all eternity^[2] for Save The Videogame. We can all lynch him later, ok.

Over here in the UK, I’ve always found the way we talk about our heritage as a bit, well, fucking embarrassing mainly. This was brought home a few weeks back on the lovely Speccy’s 30th Birthday and rather than stand up and be truly proud of what we had, once again, we drift into the same pathetic arguments over which format was best, the C64 or the Speccy with the obligatory CPC owners looking on a little bit befuddled^[3].

I know, I know some of it is mild entertainment and it’s hard not to resist a breadbin dig and they can still be rather funny but I bring this up to make the point that the one thing we’re tremendously good at in the UK is letting our games history become footnotes rather than achievements and milestones.

We’d sooner squabble than celebrate and that’s kind of a shame.

We don’t champion our quirky stuff nearly enough, we don’t champion the stuff that’s distinct, unique or y’know, just bloody fun anywhere near enough. Because we don’t talk loudly enough about our games. And we don’t really discuss them with a critical voice either. How else could we still have people walk the Earth believing that Rick Dangerous was a good thing to happen?

3d Monster Maze becomes a footnote in first person shooters, Ultimate are those guys that went on to make SNES games and Xbox avatars and we’ll talk of Jet Set Willy and Elite and Minter and Chaos but little else. Obviously Retro Gamer magazine puts in fine service on behalf of most formats and most games but it’s an outlier, we don’t talk about our gaming heritage, our gaming history nearly enough and when we do, we talk about the same things.

We’re the ones who grew up with these games, we grew up playing them, we’re the ones who’ll be first to hit up an emulator to play Obscure-o-game X and yet, we do so little to pass this knowledge on. We just don’t talk outside of our little forums and communities, we don’t give these games a chance to be heard or replayed by those who will never otherwise know about them. And that, also, is something that contributes to games disappearing into the mists of time. Because there’s no-one to tell their tale.

Who then, of the next generation of kids, will know about Technician Ted or Rapscallion or Tir Na Nog? How could they know? What are the chances of them stumbling upon any of them when the history of videogames consists of Space Invaders, Elite, Mario and something something something NINTENDO something something PLAYSTATION something something GEN3 APPLE?

You’d never know we had such a rich and diverse history in this country when it comes to videogames because it’s always Elite, it’s always Jet Set Willy and it’s always bloody Chaos or something.

So your task, for today and for the future, is to go out there and talk about the videogames you played and loved. Tell people what you found great about that pocket money game from Mastertronic with no shame^[4] because it’s one step closer to keeping these games and our history alive.

Write a blog post, make a youtube video, make a tweet, tell your kids. Shout about it. Talk about these things outside of retro circles, outside of retro meets and outside. Let’s talk about our games, the videogames that are special to us because if we don’t no-one else will.

Let’s talk about videogames. For the future and for the past.

What if there were an item one could only unlock by sharing the app through FB, Twitter, or email?

I can think of two recent examples where this has been tried and in both cases, I can promise the developers I will *never* push that “share” button to get whatever shiny lies at the end of the rainbow. In one case, it’s a whole game mode locked off in a demo that requires a share before it’s unlocked (not on an iThing either!) and in the other, it’s in an otherwise superb game and one that I’ve had no qualms recommending. No qualms except for the fact I’m uncomfortable with how it interrupts my play to ask me to advertise it and as much as being asked to tweet annoys me, it annoys me more to robotweet a game.

Matt Gemmell calls it a “sleazy promotion” and I’m inclined to agree with that. I agree with it because I actually value the people in my social network, I value my time and I value my integrity.

Let me put it this way. If I were standing in the queue at Boots, ready to buy myself some moisturiser (because my skin must remain tender and soft, sort of like the Andrex Puppy if the Andrex Puppy was losing his hair and grew a beard) and the lady at the counter said that I could have some hand lotion if I rang 5 of my friends, I would consider this a massive imposition. I would think it frankly fucking rude to be even asked this. Were I told that I could have some hand lotion if I recommended Boots to everyone in the queue behind me, the same.

I see no reason why I shouldn’t treat a social network the same.

Developers, don’t try and bribe me into being your marketing. It leads me to one of two conclusions:

1) You’re desperate. This is me being very kind now and assuming that you’re clutching at marketing straws. In which case, please – stop now. Just don’t do it. You can be better than that.

2) You think so little of me that I’m just a vessel for your marketing. At which point, I just think you’re a fucking dick.

That one share, that one tweet, that sits alongside the people who ring me after I’ve visited their store to ask for 5 minutes to discover how I find my experience there, it sits alongside the people who want 5 minutes of my time to insist that I really must have taken out PPI even though I’ve done no such thing, alongside the people who want me to fill in a survey when I first visit their site asking how my experience was (it’ll only take 5 minutes), alongside the people who send me a survey through the mail that’ll only take 5 minutes of my time after I’ve paid my bill.

Or like a certain UK company that insists its staff push web surveys on all and sundry, harassing them and their customers alike. Alongside the myriad of applications that want me to post to Twitter, alongside every marketing cunt who thinks I should click “like” on a Facebook I don’t have to see an “exclusive screenshot” or some other bollocks that just wastes my fucking time. All of which just want me to help with their marketing or to help them. It’s not just a tweet or a share, it’s one imposition amongst many.

It might just be 5 minutes to you, it might just be a tweet or a like or a share to you, but to me, it’s my time, my life and my existence that you’re trying to eat into. It’s asking me to disrespect every single follower I have in exchange for something worthless and I value people more than I value your tat.

I’m a person who will happily spread the word about a game or service I love. I will recommend things happily on Twitter without hesitation. I do so as often as I can because I believe that good things deserve to be shared. I also do so, hopefully, knowing that people recognise that I only recommend things I would genuinely recommend. And for this, I don’t need a shiny trinket for tweeting. I don’t need someone abusing my time to do that. I’ll do it because I think something is worthwhile.

Don’t bribe me. Make a good thing. Be nice. Don’t be a Zynga. I won’t have any qualms about sharing something then. Because I won’t think it’s been made by a fucknut.

“Why must we do this?”, a thousand people who make games cry every time they hear the phrase “we still don’t have our Citizen Kane of gaming”. I don’t know, because it’s funny?

Are we after Citizen Kane:The Benchmark, Citizen Kane:Because It’s Black & White or Citizen Kane:It’s a sledge? It doesn’t matter. We’re doing fine at having our OLD MEDIA moments. But it’s always Citizen Kane isn’t it? Citizen Kane:The Ocarina Of Time of films. Critics adore it and rate it number one best ever repeatedly. Most people watch Transformers:Transform Harder/play Call Of Duty:Call Harder and care not a jot.

What a waste of time and energy looking to old media to light the way. The hand of old media has touched us already. We need not to look to a 70 year old film for our moment to aspire to. No.

Our X of Y list is manyfold already. What could adding one more possibly add? Aside from this imaginary “we can only be signifificant when we do wot he did” and HE IS LONG DEAD. If it is about shame then I would be ashamed to hold up a movie from the 1940′s and say THIS, THIS IS WHERE WE NEED TO BE.

If it is the “games are going through their teenage phase” then fuck off, what does that make the movie industry that pays Michael Bay more money than most of us will ever see to make films about plastic toys? If Citizen Kane is 70 years old and Transformers:Transform With A Vengeance is 1 or 2, how does that shit work out? How?

We’ve done old media anyway. We’ve done it all.

We’ve made The Aliens Of Videogames more times than Hollywood. We’ve made The Predator Of Videogames too. We’ve made The Rambo Of Videogames a hundred times in the eighties alone. We’ve made The Marx Brothers of games, we’ve made Carry On Up The Videogame and we can’t fucking stop making The Lord Of The Fucking Rings of games. Fucking orcs.

We’ve got our Murder She Wrote/Twin Peaks crossover of gaming and we’ve got our straight to video drama of gaming and we’ve got our Independence Day of gaming so we’re doing ok on copying old media, thanks. We’re even perfectly happy to completely ineptly try and sandwich scenes from Full Metal Jacket into games set elsewhere and in a completely different era. I don’t know what that is. Probably the Kentucky Fried Movie of Videogames or something. F3AR:F3AR H4RD3R is pretty much the Every Horror Movie Third Part Of Videogames.

Man, we even gave Cyril Sneer his own sweary science fiction outing we’re that good. So we’ve got The Raccoons Of Videogames too. Raccoons In Space at that. That’s one up for videogames. We’ve got The Soap Opera Of Videogames too. I should probably offer that one without comment for the sake of all of us.

Fuck, we can do ALL THE BOOKS of gaming if we want. We let the Shit David Bowie Album Of Videogames be a thing that exists. I’m pretty sure that’s not right but still, we did it.

Who needs The Citizen Kane of Games when we’ve got The Shit Bowie Album Of Games?

We have all that and we have our media. The things we make. Where it becomes tenuous to X of Y.

We have The Poetry Of Videogames. And The Prog Rock Of Videogames. The Documentary Of Videogames. And The Rambling Of Videogames. Never forget the rambling. Ok, rambling isn’t old media but still. We make games that are akin to rambling.

They’re a stretch, aren’t they? Because they’re ours. They don’t need to look to dead old man or soon to be dead old men. They’re the new fucking things in a new fucking form.

We don’t have to accept that Call Of Duty:Call Hardest is the way the form will always be. I fucking hope, sincerely, it won’t be. I hope we can shit off the hypersexualized mangaze stuff, the bro teabags and many other things as the niche that they are. But the videogame blockbuster is one possible thing of many. And whilst Activision pump a gazillion into Call Of Duty we have thousands more pumping their souls into videogames in new and different shapes.

And we try and hold them down with “but they haven’t made the DEAD OLD MAN of videogames”? “THEY ARE NOT GOOD ENOUGH! ASPIRE TO HERE WHERE HERE IS ON A CHART I INVENTED IN MY HEAD.” That’s not a goal, that’s abuse. It’s a goal no-one can reach because its meaning can move and change on a whim.

Man alive. And in the next breath some say videogames need to grow up? They want us to aspire to be like the work of a dead old man instead of carving our own way? And it is we who should grow up?

The X of videogames is a shit thing to be looking for. It’s a pointless and vague thing to lust after.

Let’s ask for THE BEST FUCKING GAMES WE CAN MAKE instead. Then we’ll get somewhere, right? And yes, that means not accepting that the status quo is the very right way to do things.

It means bringing more people into games. It means lowering the bar and lowering the barrier to creation. It means all the thinking bigger, thinking harder and fuck, thinking more. It means taking the time to make thoughtful pieces alongside crashbangwallopwhatanexplosion pieces. It means considering what we are doing and why we are doing it and whether we should be doing it.

And sometimes, it’s even saying fuck it, I do not know, let’s see what happens.

And it means not holding us back with old media. Because old media is old and old people die.

Having to turn up in person? Not feeling like your work is worth showing off? Feeling intimidated by other works? Some other reason? Not arsed? Having to lug gear around? Something more personal?

What would stop you or what is stopping you?

Either/or. Curious mainly, but it’d be super helpful to find out whatever the reason (no matter how random).

Just to clarify, this isn’t a value judgement, this isn’t a trap or anything like that and if you feel uncomfortable signing in, anonymous is fine.

With RR losing relevency, I’ve felt sort of guilty about that myself. With remakes shifting back to the commercial end of things and with those who used to write freeware remakes either giving up or moving on, RR sort of fell by the wayside. I used to mention the odd game here for a while but the past two years have been about life not about blogging and with a passion diminished by necessity, I never noticed the drift away from freeware elsewhere also. Even if I had noticed it, I’d have not been in a position to do anything about it because life and because time.

And a few weeks ago, I sat down and looked at the sites I open up when I wake up and I realised that had changed. Sites I used to be excited to open, I open occasionally. Maybe once a week. Others, I don’t visit at all. Some have no posts, some have no posts I’m interested in, things became dev orientated in so many ways and dev is boring – I should know, I do it. Sites moved on and that’s fine. That’s ok. But nothing had really sprung up to fill the void. No-one was looking for the (rough) gems anymore. No-one was going out there, rummaging through forums, twitters, blog posts and the like, grabbing a glut of games and seeing what lies at the end of the rainbow. Or at least, if they were, they weren’t posting about it.

This isn’t obscure for the sake of obscure or hipster hat time, fuck that. The fun was always in watching nobody become somebody or a no-game becoming some-game or an unplayed-game becoming a played-game, mainly and especially the latter. Unplayed to played. All the opportunities that I was afforded when I was just starting out, pretty much gone or filtered through a route that made it harder to be heard. Games come to the sites, not the other way round for the most part. It never used to be that way and not being that way helped everyone to thrive and indie as we know it to grow*.

So I had RR, I had RR pretty much mothballed and it was decision time, really. There’s no point in keeping it alive if the only thing I’ve got to look forward to is one freeware game every six months and some commercial tatware. No, that’s no good. That’s not what I got into this for. But also I was acutely aware that to keep my own interest in things, I’d need to loosen the chains on restrictions so I opted to post about videogames I cared about, videogames that might have just one thing I found interesting = that’s worth a post, weird videogames, videogames that no-one else had posted. Even if I just went on a trawl once a week, I’d be sure to turn up something. I can always turn up something, even if it’s just one game. And videogames in general. Because I like videogames. And some random magazine tat because random magazine tat is fun. And retro remakes, obviously. I like them.

So I birthed owVideogames from the ashes. It’s RR born anew-sort-of. Games for every generation, not just remakes. Games. We’re at the end of week 1 and I’m happy with what we’ve done so far. I’m happy that I decided to make it exist. I’m happy that I get to post about games that I think are worth looking at or stuff I think is interesting and I’m happy it’s not just from press releases, competitions and the tried and trusted. I’m happy that ortoslon asked could he post a few things he liked on there. I’m happy that it’s not just my voice throwing things *I* like out there. That feels important.

It’s vague-o-focus and scattershot. I like that. I’m vague-o-focus and scattershot so it suits. I’d like it if I could get more people to post about games in the future because the more voices, the more angles, the better, but that’s probably for the future. For now I’m happy with how things are shaping up.

I don’t expect to make anyone famous, I don’t expect that large an audience all told but I hope that a few games and the odd curio will find a playing, a reading or a home on a hard drive somewhere because of it.

I’m happy I started it in the same week Terry started his freeware blog because it makes me feel slightly less mental about feeling the way I have. I’m also happy Terry took a razor sharp focus to the freeware aspect because I know I couldn’t restrict myself like that right now so I’m happy that someone else can and will.

But most of all, I’ve been happier posting the stuff on ow! this week than I have been posting anything in a long time. It’s good to be back.

*not that I’m averse to people mailing me games, y’know? In fact, I welcome it but I don’t want that to be the main focus or reason something gets posted.

When a corporation introduces a DRM scheme that makes pirating the more attractive option because the DRM makes the purchasers life more awkward, I retain the right to call that out. I won’t think of them like a mum who forgot to buy toilet roll.

If a corporation is built around cloning games and/or exploiting the players, I retain the right to call that out. I won’t think of them like my son forgetting to bring his pajamas downstairs.

If a corporation makes ever more invasive landgrabs into my time, makes me jump through more hoops, tries to siphon off more of my money solely because they’re in a position to do so, I retain the right to call that out. I will not think they’re some sort of senile aunt who got a little bit confused but that’s ok.

If a corporation includes racist, sexist, homophobic or any sort of hateful imagery or propogates such attitudes in the work they publish then I will call them out on it. They’re not one’s embarassing great grandad who read the Daily Mail too many times and doesn’t know any better.

I will not hold that families and corporations are comparable. I will not buy an “we’re all in this together and we should just get along” stance when some corporations are taking the fucking piss because they can.

And I won’t tolerate it whether someone is an indie or an AAA. This is not about battle lines. Shit behaviour is shit behaviour and should always be called out as such otherwise it ends up shit for everyone. Painting it as some sort of AAA vs Indie battle instead of what it is, calling out abusive behaviour, is strange to me and I’m not sure what not calling these things out is supposed to achieve in the long run.

Not all friction is bad friction, y’know? Especially when people are fighting for a better gaming world for everyone. Why would you want to stop that?

Along with some other truly lovely people, I contributed some words towards the Killscreen piece on The Pirate Kart.

Also, I made 9 games for The Pirate Kart last weekend because everyone should make games for The Pirate Kart. If you haven’t made games for The Pirate Kart, there’s still time. What I’m roughly trying to say is “make games for The Pirate Kart“. There’s over 800 at the time of counting which is AMAZING. Let’s get that number even higher.

The tone of a thousand Daily Mail readers screaming into the void about the kids on our lawn, this time via the medium of Eurogamer. Ridiculous Littlejohn-isms like “X-Factor generation”, “ego-frotting evil is a surge of righteous individualism” and “the feed-me-more generation”, meaningless abuse, hateful abuse and demonising an entire generation of kids and for what? To say “developers owe you nothing”. Except their fucking livelihood, right? Too easy? Yeah, I know.

The redacting of terms from the “demands” of the folks behind A Call For Communication, to leave out anything that doesn’t fit the bill, to make them sound like spoilt brats stamping their feet and screaming at Valve does not make the case that they are in the wrong, it makes the case that the case is already on the shakiest of grounds.

Their “demands”, via the piece:

“The lack of communication between Valve and the Half-Life community has been a frustrating experience,” it reads. “Fans of the Half-Life series have waited years for a word on when the franchise will return. [...] Waiting patiently for over four years is a daunting task [...] fans should at least be acknowledged in some way, regardless of developmental plans for the next Half-Life project.”

The group goals via A Call To Communication.

“The lack of communication between Valve and the Half-Life community has been a frustrating experience. While continued support for current and future products is greatly appreciated, fans of the Half-Life series have waited years for a word on when the franchise will return.

So, Instead of focusing efforts in a negative and disrespectful way, we have decided to gain Valve’s attention by delivering a basic message:

Your oldest and longest running fanbase would like better communication.

Waiting patiently for over four years can be challenging as a fan, especially when E3 comes and goes without any sign of the Half-Life series and its continuation. Valve had stated that information was scheduled to be released towards the end of 2008, and we believe that if they have chosen to change those plans, fans should be acknowledged, regardless of developmental plans for the next Half-Life project.

The entire trilogy of episodes was scheduled to be completed and released by 2007, and if Valve have decided to do other things for the time being, that is fine; all that we ask for is a basic response on the matter, and to let fans know whether or not the current story arc is scheduled to conclude at another point in time.

In addition: This message is in no way, shape or form attempting to rush the development of the Half-Life series; in fact, most members agree that Valve should take the time needed to deliver a complete and polished product.

If you agree with the above message and statements, please join this group and share your support constructively.

Hopefully such attention will be recognized by Valve, and the community’s voice will be heard.”

Emphasis mine, naturally. Egregious entitlement now, according to Mr Davies on Eurogamer is people asking nicely for not really very much at all? For a single line on the development of a game that ended on a cliffhanger where a number of years later, the fans are unsure as to whether the series will reach a conclusion?

And to deliver this message, they played Half Life 2 together. Lots of them. 13,236 people playing a game they loved to ask for a note on whether the series will be concluded is egregious entitlement, a sign of the end times, of a generation fucked? You’ll excuse me if I tilt my head and raise an eyebrow here. These people did nothing wrong.

Did the ever lovely John Walker do something wrong here in asking the same?

I don’t think so, do you?

It’s an easy lie to believe though because the internet, well, it amplifies noise. It’s easy to pick out the negative comments and have those things all that you remember. I’m sure most developers, writers or creatives would be able to tell a tale of how, amongst 30 comments praising their work, one negative one stuck out far more. It’s an easy trap to fall into, sure. But amongst all this talk of entitlement (taking the podium alongside “you’re bias”, “addicting” and “pretentious” as OH STOP IT things), how quickly we forget how wonderful most people are. Yes, including this generation that some of you old bastards want to spit on for your own self satisfaction.

They are the people who buy, with their own money, our work. They are the people who make making the next game possible. And the lunatics are in the minority.

To focus on those who would DDOS Minecraft when at the time of writing, 4,938,283 have purchased the game is to a great disservice to everyone. To focus on the people who left a one star review for Where Is My Water when in one week alone it was downloaded 6 million times and clearly is making a great deal of money is to do a great disservice to everyone. To focus on maybe twenty people complaining about the price of Terraria when the game sold 50,000 on its first day alone is to do a disservice to everyone. I’m pretty sure that most people who are fans of Devil May Cry didn’t send death threats to Ninja Theory and nor would they. I’m pretty comfortable in guessing that’s the case, y’know?

This isn’t the entitled generation. This is the generation where more people are more supportive of more things and they’re more supportive in the most wonderful of ways. There is no X-Factor generation, there’s just people and people are, mainly, pretty damn fucking good and do amazing things at the drop of a hat. They brony up the cash to the Humble Bundle, they allow Double Fine to buy their creative freedom (even if it is only for just one game), on a personal note, they saved my Christmas and made sure I didn’t starve when I fell ill from pneumonia, an illness that took me over six months to recover from so bastard close was I to shuffling off from here.

Being a fan is not just a case of sitting in a chair as the Eurogamer piece would have you believe, it’s a case of going out there and earning the money to buy the product, to support the developers, the publishers and whoever else has their skin in the game. It is the decision to choose us, to choose what we make, over something else where that something else might well be more food or a pair of jeans.

It’s important never to forget that. This is not us versus them, this is us cannot do what we do without them. We should all remember that and respect that people choose our works and treat them with respect too. Because unlike being a fan, being respectful *is* something we can all do from our chairs.

That doesn’t mean bowing to the lunatic minority, obviously. It does mean remembering they are just that though, a minority. Don’t damn a generation on the back of a few forum threads or comments sections. Don’t make it us versus them by our actions and our words.

We can do better than that. And by “we”, I mean developers, publishers, journalists, all in.

Let’s give it a try, eh? It’s got to be better than having to mangle quotes to make a point and making Littlejohn seem like the voice of reason, right?

I don’t own a game store.
So when your boss comes in and says
“About those second hand sales”
Before you punish me
Do I own a game store?

I don’t pirate your games.
So when you sit there and say
“If we could just convert 1% of pirates today”
Before you punish me
Do I help pay your wage?