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> Books are much better to foster deeper introspection, there's a reason why it's the chosen medium for explaining ideas in detail. Language is chosen as the m

> Books are much better to foster deeper introspection, there's a reason why it's the chosen medium for explaining ideas in detail. Language is chosen as the medium of communication because there is no real other option, not because writing something in a book makes people think about it more. > A video game has a different pace, different games have very different pace, some will give you a similar experience allowing you to stop and wonder, others will tumble you around frantically. Utter nonsense. All games allow you to stop and think because all games terminate at some point, after which you may reflect on the decisions you made. All games have a failure state which provides a lull in action for the precise purpose of allowing reflection. There is little difference between gaming and reading in this regard. A gamer is just as free as a reader to reflect on their experiences, or not to do so. And just as how you cannot reflect while participating in a game, you struggle to reflect on a book while simultaneously reading more of the text.

piva00 2y ago
> Utter nonsense. All games allow you to stop and think because all games terminate at some point, after which you may reflect on the decisions you made. All games have a failure state which provides a lull in action for the precise purpose of allowing reflection. As someone who gamed a lot in life while also liking to read, utter nonsense. No game has ever gave me the opportunity to re-read the same "page" or sentence on the spot, multiple times in a row, triggering another layer of thought or insight from the same 3-5 seconds. None. I'm not as free to reflect on the experience while the game keeps going on, the lulls are pre-programmed, not my own pace, I cannot stop mid-sentence and realise something new, a game guides to the completion of that action and stopping mid-way is unnatural, opposed to a book. It's a very different experience, I really cannot comprehend how you are saying they are absolutely equivalent...
- Timon3 2y ago
  > No game has ever gave me the opportunity to re-read the same "page" or sentence on the spot, multiple times in a row, triggering another layer of thought or insight from the same 3-5 seconds. None. Maybe you just haven't played the right games? Many do in fact allow you to do this. CRPGs usually allow you to take as much time in a conversation or dialog as you want or even replay whole conversations, and Visual Novel games often have an explicit log of every line that you can go back to and read through.
  - card_zero 2y ago
    It's not all about reading, anyway. An open-world RPG is a special, dream-like thing, and inspires me with all kinds of thoughts, but I prefer my RPGs (or roguelikes or sims) not to be polluted with stories - which, come to think of it, is because stories trammel the imagination, putting the game "on rails", as is sometimes said. Nor do I want a story to emerge as I play: that's not even what the whole experience is about. It's kind of like looking at a picture. Fragments of story-like things come to mind and fade away again, and again, inspired by the setting, while you handle the mechanisms and tactics of the gameplay as a kind of exciting meditation. I only play games that are turn-based, or that I can pause. Those are the only real games. The others are like fairground rides. Maybe once in a while I'll play pinball or something but it's a whole other category (and story-laden adventure games are another category again).
- James_K 2y ago
  > No game has ever gave me the opportunity to re-read the same "page" You shouldn't claim to know anything about games if you have never willingly replayed a level of one after completing it. Or even replayed a level full stop, as the better analogy here is one where you fail to fully grasp a passage on the first try just as one might fail to complete a level on the first try. In fact, the way you seem to think a game is entirely pre-programmed and moves independently of your interaction with it makes me wonder if you've played any games at all. Which game were you thinking of when you wrote this post? Everything you mentioned has very obvious analogues in gaming.
  - piva00 2y ago
    > In fact, the way you seem to think a game is entirely pre-programmed and moves independently of your interaction with it makes me wonder if you've played any games at all. You are either misunderstanding or misrepresenting what I said, in either case you are wrong. > You shouldn't claim to know anything about games if you have never willingly replayed a level of one after completing it. Or even replayed a level full stop, as the better analogy here is one where you fail to fully grasp a passage on the first try just as one might fail to complete a level on the first try Of course I did, and that's why I'm stating with absolute certainty that this isn't at all close to my relationship and experience with books. > Which game were you thinking of when you wrote this post? Everything you mentioned has very obvious analogues in gaming. I'm thinking of games with any kind of history/lore ranging from titles I'd consider more similar to books such as "Day of the Tentacle", "Full Throttle", to the modern incantations like "Last Of Us", passing through adventure/action games like "Castlevania", "Metroid", "Ultima" series, "Elder Scrolls" series, "Final Fantasy" series (played only VII, VIII, Tactics but they all follow the FF formula), "Legend of Zelda" (played all the SNES/N64 and the Switch ones), and also modern incantations like "Dark Souls", "Metal Gear Solid" (played 1 and 2), so on and so forth, just a brief list of what I'd like to mention to shutdown the argument that I don't know what I'm talking about. None of these games were ever the same experience as a book, they are their own media, with its own strengths but never, ever really like my experience with books.
    - James_K 2y ago

piva00 2y ago

> Utter nonsense. All games allow you to stop and think because all games terminate at some point, after which you may reflect on the decisions you made. All games have a failure state which provides a lull in action for the precise purpose of allowing reflection. As someone who gamed a lot in life while also liking to read, utter nonsense. No game has ever gave me the opportunity to re-read the same "page" or sentence on the spot, multiple times in a row, triggering another layer of thought or insight from the same 3-5 seconds. None. I'm not as free to reflect on the experience while the game keeps going on, the lulls are pre-programmed, not my own pace, I cannot stop mid-sentence and realise something new, a game guides to the completion of that action and stopping mid-way is unnatural, opposed to a book. It's a very different experience, I really cannot comprehend how you are saying they are absolutely equivalent...

Timon3 2y ago
> No game has ever gave me the opportunity to re-read the same "page" or sentence on the spot, multiple times in a row, triggering another layer of thought or insight from the same 3-5 seconds. None. Maybe you just haven't played the right games? Many do in fact allow you to do this. CRPGs usually allow you to take as much time in a conversation or dialog as you want or even replay whole conversations, and Visual Novel games often have an explicit log of every line that you can go back to and read through.
- card_zero 2y ago
  It's not all about reading, anyway. An open-world RPG is a special, dream-like thing, and inspires me with all kinds of thoughts, but I prefer my RPGs (or roguelikes or sims) not to be polluted with stories - which, come to think of it, is because stories trammel the imagination, putting the game "on rails", as is sometimes said. Nor do I want a story to emerge as I play: that's not even what the whole experience is about. It's kind of like looking at a picture. Fragments of story-like things come to mind and fade away again, and again, inspired by the setting, while you handle the mechanisms and tactics of the gameplay as a kind of exciting meditation. I only play games that are turn-based, or that I can pause. Those are the only real games. The others are like fairground rides. Maybe once in a while I'll play pinball or something but it's a whole other category (and story-laden adventure games are another category again).
James_K 2y ago
> No game has ever gave me the opportunity to re-read the same "page" You shouldn't claim to know anything about games if you have never willingly replayed a level of one after completing it. Or even replayed a level full stop, as the better analogy here is one where you fail to fully grasp a passage on the first try just as one might fail to complete a level on the first try. In fact, the way you seem to think a game is entirely pre-programmed and moves independently of your interaction with it makes me wonder if you've played any games at all. Which game were you thinking of when you wrote this post? Everything you mentioned has very obvious analogues in gaming.
- piva00 2y ago
  > In fact, the way you seem to think a game is entirely pre-programmed and moves independently of your interaction with it makes me wonder if you've played any games at all. You are either misunderstanding or misrepresenting what I said, in either case you are wrong. > You shouldn't claim to know anything about games if you have never willingly replayed a level of one after completing it. Or even replayed a level full stop, as the better analogy here is one where you fail to fully grasp a passage on the first try just as one might fail to complete a level on the first try Of course I did, and that's why I'm stating with absolute certainty that this isn't at all close to my relationship and experience with books. > Which game were you thinking of when you wrote this post? Everything you mentioned has very obvious analogues in gaming. I'm thinking of games with any kind of history/lore ranging from titles I'd consider more similar to books such as "Day of the Tentacle", "Full Throttle", to the modern incantations like "Last Of Us", passing through adventure/action games like "Castlevania", "Metroid", "Ultima" series, "Elder Scrolls" series, "Final Fantasy" series (played only VII, VIII, Tactics but they all follow the FF formula), "Legend of Zelda" (played all the SNES/N64 and the Switch ones), and also modern incantations like "Dark Souls", "Metal Gear Solid" (played 1 and 2), so on and so forth, just a brief list of what I'd like to mention to shutdown the argument that I don't know what I'm talking about. None of these games were ever the same experience as a book, they are their own media, with its own strengths but never, ever really like my experience with books.
  - James_K 2y ago