Quote from: Bradford C. Walker;884704Fantasy? None of that shit. "There's treasure in them thar hills, and we aim to get it." works, (...)

No, it doesn't!

Nowadays it's "everyone pay attention to my 150 years old, chibi-looking, half-Drow half-draconic half-Kender and half-Siren, extravert, transgender, non aligned, Ranger/Assasin/Paladin/Cleric of Mangina special snowflake character, also here's my list of "no-no" for the game: the most important is that I have to win and can't be ever bothered with even an allusion of failed test".

Yep, that's what fantasy is all about nowadays.

...Ahem...

Quote from: Bradford C. Walker;884704"Exploring the implications of a posited technological or scientific development." is internal. It works best in drama (written or performed). It's terrible as gameplay, even in videogames, and falls into the stuff that gets skipped until it's directly and immediately relevant to the action at hand.

Just to clarify what this means, how did you feel about the video game Soma for example?

Quote from: JesterRaiin;884714No, it doesn't!

Nowadays it's "everyone pay attention to my 150 years old, chibi-looking, half-Drow half-draconic half-Kender and half-Siren, extravert, transgender, non aligned, Ranger/Assasin/Paladin/Cleric of Mangina special snowflake character, also here's my list of "no-no" for the game: the most important is that I have to win and can't be ever bothered with even an allusion of failed test".

Yep, that's what fantasy is all about nowadays.

...Ahem...

Exalted is not the entire market, you know.

well i finally watched the video........

and its exactly what i expected badly written extra credits bullshit where we cant even be bothered to get are terminology right

Quote from: Shipyard Locked;884721Just to clarify what this means, how did you feel about the video game Soma for example?

Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem is an attempt at proper horror, due to the way the game flat-out cheated to trick the player into reacting, replicating (as best as the Gamecube allowed) the sorts of craft tools that written and spoken horror use to get into the reader/listener's head. That's internal.

It's also one of the reasons for why few follow-ups are done, as it's usually a thing that only works once- and only until the reviews come out. Spec Ops: The Line was one such follow-up (inspired by Conrad's Heart of Darkness), but most gamers didn't give a shit about the intended horror; they just fulfilled mission objectives in order to complete the game, maybe with a "Well, that's fucked up." here and there, but otherwise completely ignoring it. (Much the same is true for reports of Darkness playthroughs.)

The videogame medium, despite being perfect for making spectacles of sight and sound, just doesn't work due to the completely different approach the audience has. It's well-known that common gamers are objective-focused, especially when they're playing, and as such they often become resistant or immune to such things in gaming. That same mentality applies to TRPG gamers, as Dancey found out when he got the survey data over 15 years ago (so this is a known issue).

Why the hell do you think D&D--in its default form--remains the RPG paradigm by default? Because that's what is (a) most playable, and (b) has no requirements for prior knowledge (can be done stupid) or preparation (can be done cold) so you can just get on with it already. Gamers, on the whole, are too busy getting shit done to bother with being scared. It just gets in the way- and the position of (and jokes about) Call of Cthulhu show it.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;884867Exalted is not the entire market, you know.

I know it, you know it, they don't.

Quote from: Bradford C. Walker;884909Gamers, on the whole, are too busy getting shit done to bother with being scared. It just gets in the way- and the position of (and jokes about) Call of Cthulhu show it.

IME it has more to do with a LOT of people not being all that fond of horror. They might like a bit of spooky stuff on Halloween but they're not generally into being scared. Even horror 'fans' are often in it for some other element... gore, violence, 'gothic' atmosphere. They alleviate the tension with bad jokes.

Quote from: CRKrueger;884059The SW vs. ST stuff I always thought was stupid.  Jackass one who doesn't know what a Gigawatt is puts 5.7GW because he thinks it's big, some other jackass puts 4000GW because he thinks it's big and you end up with Jackass #3 claiming that objectively Slave one can shoot a hole through 18 Borg Cubes.  It's just Idiocy.

The calculations foe SW tech come from Curtis Saxton (an astrophysicist) and Michael Wong (a mechanical engineer) -not exactly what I'd consider jackasses.

QuoteObviously SW methods of FTL are superior (but this is variable.  A New Hope isn't the same scale as the prequels and the entire ST series up to that point doesn't match Khan v.2.0 when you can get from Earth to the Klingon Homeworld in like 12 minutes.)

ANH is exactly the same scale as the Prequels: a ship can travel from the outer rim of the galaxy to the center in a matter of hours, as shown in ROTS. As for the other example you gave, I think we're all better served by avoiding anything J.J. Abrams has had a hand in. He's the Vanilla Ice of film.

Quote from: RPGPundit;884465I've seen a lot of people have a lot of warring definitions of just what constitutes "true" Science Fiction.

That's because a lot of people are extremely stupid.

Quote from: JesterRaiin;884573No harm done. I simply doubted my own memory.



Hmmm... :hmm:

Observe that:

• While this is military operation, it happens on Corporate ground. It means that military got only as much info as the Corporation decided to share. Burke, Corporate delegate says it out loud: "You're mere grunts". It means that to his employees, Marines are merely... assets. Pawns, accessories. In fact, think about it: the Corporation had a dossier on everyone. Why didn't they insist on a leader more experienced than Lt. Gorman? It's entirely possible that this whole disaster was orchestrated on a higher level, and everyone (including Burke) was expendable, sent there only to test how soldiers would fare against possible bio-weapon.
  
• Marines fell victims of their own legend. Strongest, toughest mofos on this side of the galaxy and all that testosterone. Vasquez dismisses Ripley's fears as "just bugs". Everyone laughs. In addition, in Director's Cut edition of Aliens, there's a scene where Hudson brags about all equipment they have at their disposal. They are clearly overconfident. Screw Gorman - their leader. There's Sgt. Apone and Col. "reasonable cool guy" Hicks. Neither thought it's very important to invest more time into additional research.
  
• Nobody trusts Ripley until it's too late, and from the point of view of everyone onboard of "Sullaco" she has no authority. After all, she's just a woman with unclear past and mental issues, neither a marine, nor an important Company delegate.

All this (and more) led to the disaster, so I don't think Lt. Gorman is the sole responsible for Marines' defeat.

He's the commanding officer -he's responsible. Not taking Ripley seriously when she's the only source of intelligence is a blunder of Custer-like proportions, and with similar results.

Quote from: Elfdart;884978He's the commanding officer -he's responsible.

You have your scapegoat. Hooray!

I see the Big (or at least bigger) Picture. Yay!

:cool:

Quote from: Elfdart;884977The calculations foe SW tech come from Curtis Saxton (an astrophysicist) and Michael Wong (a mechanical engineer) -not exactly what I'd consider jackasses.

The problem with calculations like that is, they're based on nothing, really.   A beam of light coming off a Star Destroyer bounces the Falcon around, in a different movie, it blows a piece off an MC Cruiser.  Why?  Because it was supposed to.  No one at Lucas Arts ever stopped to say "Gee, you think this shot should have done more or less damage based on what we know of the GW capabilities of a turbolaser?"  oh wait, one intern did, before they were replaced.

The only thing you could really point to is the Death Star, but how much power is needed to actually destroy a planet?

The problem is, I don't care how much of a scientist you are, you're taking something that was done simply because the plot or scene needed it and trying to make the truth of what was done there, say something objective about the setting, and then extrapolate from there.

Well, we know they have Letter A, so they must have Letter B, etc... therefore Hamlet.  :nono:

For example, Mr. Saxton claims the Empire collects energy by shooting lasers through the ergosphere of a Black Hole...  I don't care how many letters you have after your name, that's an asspull.

Since the Empire is shown to possess near limitless energy, then they must, therefore be able to create near limitless energy, therefore they have to have these theoretical technologies, which means then they must have other theoretical technologies... :hand:

Pick a sci-fi fandom.  You get hooked as kids, you grow up and then make the shit Serious Business (because at that point it is serious business, because there's serious money).  So you look at everything put to page and film, and use those as Ex Post Facto canon creation.

Now, take "universe made of collection of retroactive asspulls A", and then attempt to objectively prove it's dominance over "universe made of collection of retroactive asspulls B" and "universe made of collection of retroactive asspulls C".

That's every Star Wars vs. Star Trek vs. Imperium of Man thread...ever.

The REAL answer is, the Federation would curbstomp the Empire and the Imperium every single time no matter what.

Why?  They're the good guys.


..and then the Tyranids, which are probably the Universes Immune System as created by {whoever} would scour all galaxies clean, leaving behind just enough organic material to start life over again...see you again in a Trillion years. :cool:

Quote from: RPGPundit;884465I've seen a lot of people have a lot of warring definitions of just what constitutes "true" Science Fiction.

If my wife doesn't hate it then it isn't Science Fiction.

Quote from: soltakss;884998If my wife doesn't hate it then it isn't Science Fiction.

for give me for asking  but im curious why???

I didn't mind the video. I got what they were trying to say, I just kind of found the distinction pointless for the most part. I would generally only make the distinction between science fiction and science fantasy if I was trying to describe a preference for one or the other, but honestly I don't. I'm as good watching Farscape as I am reading HG Wells. I enjoyed Primer and I like DrWho. I don't like Star Trek in general, but thats nothing to do with its genre. But if a person really liked one, but didnt care for the other, I could see why establishing terminology for the distinction might be useful to them.

As far as why "true science fiction games are rarer", however, I find the question to be a bit off-putting, even if I accept the terminology. It's just the "true" part that fills my head full of angry Scotsmen. Its simply not a good way of expressing it, because it comes across as denigrating. Sure that's just a quirk of language, but being aware of how the nuances of language affect how an idea is perceived/interpreted is a skill that grows in importance every day as face-to-face communication becomes rarer and people fill in the gaps for the sub-language of "tone".

Its not that I wouldn't (or didn't) extend the benefit of the doubt, more that I'm acutely aware that most people online won't do that. If anything, the opposite.

So, instead, I'd phrase it as why are "hard sci-fi" games rarer than "fantasy sci-fi" games? And the answer is simple: the same reason historical games are rarer than pseudo-medieval fantasy games: its less work. Its an answer thats been given often in this thread, and its simple, but its correct. Its easier to pull shit out of one's ass than adhere to reality/speculative reality. And I'm not sure for most players the difference is worth the effort. That said, I don't think "hard sci-fi" games are that rare, certainly not as rare as historical rpgs.

Quote from: kosmos1214;885104for give me for asking  but im curious why???

She hates anything SciFi with a vengeance. I love SciFi. It makes going to the cinema interesting ...

She also hates RPGs as well ...