How much do you care about Doom's plot?

[Arctangent]

Just now, 40oz said:

And you can do a lot better about receiving opinions as if they are fact. 

 

You all lose.

Gov, I know you insist on the idea of people being mind-readers that instantly know every thing other people are saying even when they're floundering around with their words, but you really need to realize that that's completely unrealistic and you only add fuel to the fire by insinuating anyone who doesn't know the other person better than they know themselves are assholes.

 

And it's not even good fuel. It's like, hypercoal with a thousand times the pollution rate of regular coal.

[40oz]

8 minutes ago, Arctangent said:

mind-readers

THREAD TITLE READERS

[Tristan]

34 minutes ago, KVELLER said:

I was just asking for opinions on Doom's plot, not looking to start a flame war. NIH and Arc have different opinions, and that's ok. That's why I made the topic in the first place. But ffs, just leave each other's opinions alone. And why in the hell are we talking about Tetris??

 

Jeez.

 

Welcome to Doomworld.

[Arctangent]

Just now, 40oz said:

THREAD TITLE READERS

I mean, yes? The thread has a title?

 

I'm not sure what part you're stuck on, either the fact that replies can deviate from being exactly what the title says or that posts can have multiple aspects to them. When stuff like

 

12 hours ago, Nine Inch Heels said:

Things such as "gratification" by way of visuals do not equal story telling per se.

is said, it has little to directly do with the title of "How much do you care about Doom's plot?," but the post still has a link to that with:

 

12 hours ago, Nine Inch Heels said:

I play doom to dodge attacks and kill stuff, preferably fast.

but, of course, it's still a different aspect to the post than that. The latter is putting down an opinion relating to the topic. The former is an incorrect fact that doesn't get automatically covered by "it's just an opinion" ( although it'd still be a bad and incorrect opinion anyway ) intrinsic to the thread title.

 

I feel like this is something that'd come naturally to someone who's been on forums for at least 11 years. It's a really common thing, after all; pretty sure like a majority of both my and your replies that are more than a sentence or two long have stuff like this.

[rehelekretep]

jesus h. christ give it a rest

[Memfis]

I really like the feeling when the levels kind of tell a story in my head. I usually don't care about the text screens and can even intentionally ignore them so that they don't influence my own vision. I mean, usually it's a super lame story about doomguy having to journey to hell once again, something so boring that once you learn about it you just wish you could forget it. But I enjoy thinking about what's going on, especially when the maps are not hyper dynamic all the time and have these moments where you have to walk around for like 5 minutes thinking what to do next without encountering any monsters. I think low difficulty also helps here as it's hard to get philosophical when medikits are all that's on your mind.

 

Marswar is in my opinion perfect for this. It's really relaxing most of the time, you can almost play it on autopilot. Many levels are exploratory and mysterious. There are realistic design elements combined with surreal imagery everywhere, and the unusual music can put you in a weird state. Some maps have quite clear narratives (like Map22 is about a warehouse robbery), while others combine a bunch of crazy stuff and leave everything for you to figure out (like Map16 with the floating toothbrush and all that weirdness). There is a lot of geek culture in Marswar (Linux vs Windows theme, models of old computers, references to cult sci-fi and old Amiga games), as well as some personal stuff like that large secret area in Map27 where you appear inside of the author's house. It's just packed with ideas and images. Man, what an awesome wad it is.

[[McD] James]

I care very little about Doom's plot, but it's nice that it's there. 

 

I'll vouch on behalf of DoDonPachi's plot, which (to my understanding) boils down to being about an exiled legion of robotic killer bees on the moon sending waifus back in time to exterminate the human species. 

[40oz]

16 minutes ago, Arctangent said:

I mean,

I mean, I mean, I mean,

 

I understand what you mean, your argument is not wrong. I'm responding to you because I don't think you realize that this conflict between fact and opinion is something that literally everyone here is able to overlook because they understand the context of this thread to appeal to opinion. So when we read something that is stated as if it is a fact, we are able to interpret it in a manner that this person writing it perceives it as fact because that's how serious the opinion feels to them.

 

Everyone here seems to understand that, and I think you do too. That's not the topic of conversation and you're attempting to command the thread to make that the topic of conversation instead of making your own thread about it and it's making the forums a drag for everyone. 

[Arctangent]

1 minute ago, 40oz said:

I mean, I mean, I mean,

ah yes, assholery based around mocking a tic someone has, what a great way to start

 

1 minute ago, 40oz said:

I understand what you mean, your argument is not wrong. I'm responding to you because I don't think you realize that this conflict between fact and opinion is something that literally everyone here is able to overlook because they understand the context of this thread to appeal to opinion. So when we read something that is stated as if it is a fact, we are able to interpret it in a manner that this person writing it perceives it as fact because that's how serious the opinion feels to them.

This is really just forcing your own perspective on anyone else, you realize? I mean, I get where you're coming from, but I don't come from there. You may think it's safe to assume such huge distinction and not read between the lines, and maybe for you, there's really never been an issue that would require changing that. But for me, I really have no way of telling whether someone's just being lazy with their typing or if it means exactly what it looks like it means, or what it means when you put it in the context of everything around it. There's just so much meaning that a sentence structure can hold and people do make use of it.

 

1 minute ago, 40oz said:

That's not the topic of conversation and you're attempting to command the thread to make that the topic of conversation instead of making your own thread about it and it's making the forums a drag for everyone. 

This really seems more like a call for the reddit-style of branching off of individual replies instead of just having one big ol' chronological view, since making a new thread completely breaks the flow and removes the context of a conversation. Maybe the concept of "linked threads" would work better with the current system in place, where like you drag one reply out of a thread to act as a sort of pre-OP post to a new thread and there's like, various things connecting the two otherwise separate threads, but I dunno.

[Xaser]

This thread has a deeper plot than Doom at this point.

[Dynamo]

I don't care about plot in doom or even most videogames really, I wish most of them would do away with it. Marathon is the one exception that comes to mind where the story was enjoyable but even then it was completely optional (sometimes even purposefully hidden from the player).

[Battle_Korbi]

43 minutes ago, Memfis said:

I really like the feeling when the levels kind of tell a story in my head. I usually don't care about the text screens and can even intentionally ignore them so that they don't influence my own vision. I mean, usually it's a super lame story about doomguy having to journey to hell once again, something so boring that once you learn about it you just wish you could forget it. But I enjoy thinking about what's going on, especially when the maps are not hyper dynamic all the time and have these moments where you have to walk around for like 5 minutes thinking what to do next without encountering any monsters. I think low difficulty also helps here as it's hard to get philosophical when medikits are all that's on your mind.

1

This is my approach as well. Thanks Memfis, you just spared us all from my writing by keeping it nice and clean :D

 

Besides the quote, I also wanna add something:

 

I may appear as a absolute frontal noobface when picking the first option in the poll, but that is simply my style. I don't really feel like just mashing buttons and thinking about numbers all the time, paint me green but a traces of plot rolling around can get me going. I cannot imagine myself just staring at the screen at shooting monochromatic gatherings of pixels all the time, there has to be some sort of a plot or story when I am playing something, and when the maker/developer doesn't provide one, fine, I will make one myself.

 

That is kinda what made my day back when I had those bootleggy types of "pocket games" that had like "99 games" which were actually just like 12 of them but in diffrent colors and intensity. One game had me control this letter H and shoot little bits at other letters H. Number crunchers are probably fine with this, but I wasn't. I had to envision a cinematic like experience which explanes why am I fightning against these other Hs; one of these variations involved me piloting a turtle-like mecha and defending a park/house/school (whenever I was) from the enemy mechas which rolled into the area and tried to outflank me. These "games" didn't have complex AI or astounding graphics, nor did they ever bother telling a story, but just imagining the plot moved me forward, I didn't want to see a "You win!" or anything, nor did I want to get above the previous high score, no, I wanted to be a "war hero who fought with all of his spirit, defending this single chokepoint, until he was overwhelmed" Who were the enemy? Why was I fightning? Reasons changed as my mind was racing, but in the end, there was never a game that I have played without envisioning a movie out of it first.

 

This is the same case with me today playing Doom. I am not having fun just by shooting at demons, there is probably a stupid reason somewhere, and that is why I look into the plot. If I am not satisfied with the plot, or if I don't find any, I provide my own scenario and skip the text walls. But if someone has already made a story or a plot or a premise or whatever, I feel a bit glad knowing that someone had the same feels as me one day and that my curious ramblings of where I was a kid are not invalid at all, and that inspires me to make wads and stuff as well. Say what you want, but sometimes I could pick a terrywad instead of a good map just because of the " " " " "plot" " " " " ".

[Dynamo]

I believe what Memfis is referencing is largely the map's atmosphere which, yes, I agree is a very important aspect of the game and allows your imagination to run wild which at least in my opinion is part of why the game is so enjoyable.

[Battle_Korbi]

1 minute ago, Dynamo said:

I believe what Memfis is referencing is largely the map's atmosphere which, yes, I agree is a very important aspect of the game and allows your imagination to run wild which at least in my opinion is part of why the game is so enjoyable.

Oh shoot I forgot to add that part, thanks for reminding me.

[leodoom85]

That's why I said in the first page of this topic as "What plot?"

In Doom, looks like that you can make the plot, not the game itself.

[Arctangent]

5 minutes ago, leodoom85 said:

That's why I said in the first page of this topic as "What plot?"

In Doom, looks like that you can make the plot, not the game itself.

Well, you're completely forgetting the fact that the game sets up the plot for you. If the mechanics and the assets that makes those mechanics less abstract didn't provide you with the pen nor the paper, you wouldn't exactly be able to write, no?

[Nine Inch Heels]

Okay, I've decided to just skip most of the utter bullshit and get to the interesting part:

5 minutes ago, Arctangent said:

The latter is putting down an opinion relating to the topic. The former is an incorrect fact that doesn't get automatically covered by "it's just an opinion" ( although it'd still be a bad and incorrect opinion anyway ) intrinsic to the thread title.

 

I feel like this is something that'd come naturally to someone who's been on forums for at least 11 years. It's a really common thing, after all; pretty sure like a majority of both my and your replies that are more than a sentence or two long have stuff like this.

The thread title goes as follows: "How much do you care about Doom's plot?"

Here's what you think it reads: "How much do you think does everybody have to care about a videogame's plot? And why do they care even when they don't, according to your supposedly deep understanding of both the human mind and videogame design?"

 

"I do not care about it" is the exact answer this thread is looking to get from me personally, because it turns out I don't care about it. I somehow know exactly how little I care and why that is the case. It is an absolute fact that I do not care about vanilla Doom's plot. I am allowed not to give a shit, I do not need your permission for that, I do not need you to be okay with that, I don't need you to see it the way I do.

 

This thread is not about what you think it should to be about, the thread is about what the OP says it is about, and KVELLER actually re-stated that he was asking for "opinions". Where you are coming from and why when you're passing judgement on my personal POV for instance matters fuck all. This thread is not looking to get an "objective truth", so get the fuck away from my opinion, stop derailing the thread even more, and mind your own shit for a change.

[Arctangent]

36 minutes ago, Nine Inch Heels said:

stuff

I'm not really sure how you quoted the one post establishing exactly how my issue was everything except you stating your opinion relating to the topic, then proceeded to act like it was a matter of stating your opinion relating to the topic.

Edited February 15, 2018 by Arctangent : whooooooooooooops

[leodoom85]

23 minutes ago, Arctangent said:

Well, you're completely forgetting the fact that the game sets up the plot for you. If the mechanics and the assets that makes those mechanics less abstract didn't provide you with the pen nor the paper, you wouldn't exactly be able to write, no?

Sure, but still you would find the means to "write" anyway.

 

One more thing about this thread. This thread derailed to the point that it's not good to read anymore. Well, what can anyone expect for such a simple answer if it ends up convoluted like in this case eh?

[Arctangent]

Just now, leodoom85 said:

Sure, but still you would find the means to "write" anyway.

Possibly? It's really hard to say.

 

Like, if you really did have a game that completely tossed away the abstraction and only presented you with all the variables under the hood, then yeah you'd almost certainly have to come up with your own abstraction to be able to figure out what's even going on in parseable terms. But even with such an extreme case, is what you're coming up with actually far from what the creator tried to make people come up with?

 

Let me put it this way: You're playing Super Mario Bros, and your only feedback coming from the game is the gamesim's numbers. Not even labeled numbers, just the numbers themselves. You can see Mario's power up state, his position on screen, his score and life count, whatever way the game uses to store its levels, the positions of other moving entities and their state, etc.. Once you've figure out what numbers react to what and can play it ... well, wouldn't your interpretation of what's happening still end up involving your player character moving from right the left, jumping over and on things, and growing when it touches certain things and getting hurt and shrinking with it touches others?

 

That's really just how tightly woven stuff like this is in the very basics of games themselves. You basically have to make a game that intentionally has a narrative dissonant from its mechanics, art style, soundtrack, etc., but even then, it might be possible that the lack of a traditional narrative throughline to it all manages to just become an unconventional one instead.

[40oz]

29 minutes ago, Arctangent said:

I'm not really sure how you quoted the one post establishing exactly how my issue was everything about you stating your opinion relating to the topic, then proceeded to act like it was a matter of stating your opinion relating to the topic.

AGIJER;OGJRGJSE;ROGJISRTGSROGJTNB IUSV;O;farvjrioagvnma;ojgrmaroigjaorigntsgnkjfslog

[Tristan]

Would the scrolling to the right custom title still work on the new forum?

[Arctangent]

4 minutes ago, 40oz said:

AGIJER;OGJRGJSE;ROGJISRTGSROGJTNB IUSV;O;farvjrioagvnma;ojgrmaroigjaorigntsgnkjfslog

Okay, I'll completely admit that that's a really hideous typo - that "about" should really be "except."

 

whoops

[Linguica]

Oh my god shut up