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From: buzzard@world.std.com (Sean T Barrett)
Subject: Re: you people are masochists: on quitting
Message-ID: <G46JsE.HD2@world.std.com>
Date: Fri, 17 Nov 2000 17:41:02 GMT
References: <G45vtz.791@world.std.com> <slrn91afog.71.cerutti@fiad06.norwich.edu> <G46GJH.Fv2@world.std.com> <slrn91apm7.7g.cerutti@fiad06.norwich.edu>
Organization: The World Public Access UNIX, Brookline, MA
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Xref: news.duke.edu rec.games.int-fiction:58570

Neil Cerutti <cerutti@together.net> wrote:
[re: planet of the infinite minds]
>Yup. Apart from that one action, I never figured out how to do
>anything in the end of time. I started using the walkthrough, but
>I still got too frustrated to continue the game.
>
>But the writing was funny. I loved the dialogue with the gypsy,
>even though I had nothing to do with it.

While I feel everybody is entitled to their own opinion,
and that the point of the comp is to summarize those opinions,
one thing that frustrates me is that the end comp result may
well influence the actions of future authors.  For that
reason, not only do I wish every judge would give obviously
buggy games or obviously non-IF games (like What-IF) a 1,
but I get frustrated with seeing judges allow good writing
to *offset* poor "game" design (for lack of a more universal
term) or implementation problems in their votes.  If the only
thing that's good is the writing, shouldn't we be encouraging
people not to follow in those footsteps, but rather go write
plain F instead?  (In my opinion, to generate a score from 1
to 100 for a work of IF, rate the writing 1-100, rate the
interactivity-design 1-100, then don't AVERAGE them; multiply
them together as percentages.  BOTH must be good, one can't
offset the other.)

I wish I could provide a clear rant against the "non-interactivity"
of Rameses as well--I don't care if the effect was intentional--but
I guess BAP is just as "on rails" as Rameses, and if I rated BAP
highly simply because I enjoyed it, I guess I have no right to
criticize others for rating Rameses highly as IF.  I was hoping
maybe somebody else would find a way to put into words why I
don't think that comparison is valid--why Rameses fails as IF--but
it seems generally highly regarded amongst reviewers, so I guess
I'll have to think about it more.

Here's a really weak attempt at an analogy:

   buzzard says, "This is my novel about a character who can't read."
   buzzard hands you a book with all the pages glued together.

Maybe something like that is clever, but is it really a *novel*?
I think that fairly reasonably represents my reaction to the
claim that Rameses is a successful work of IF.

SeanB
[no, that's not a transcript from an actual mud]
