Politics_Observer wrote:What would be an example of a video game that would be bad for somebody overall, and why? What would be an example of a video game that is good for somebody overall, and why? Last question, what is an awesome video game you have played lately, and why is it good?
For now, I’d like to answer the last two questions, i.e. a game which I’ve played recently and think is actually good for you.
It’s called
The Talos Principle, and I’m going to try to explain why this game is not only my favorite video game of all time, but it might just be my favorite piece of media ever released; i.e. better than any piece of literature, cinema, or music that I’ve ever had the pleasure of experiencing.
First of all, I’d like to say that what matters to me most when it comes to video games is the lore. If the game hasn’t got a good story, then in all probability I won’t play it with some minor exceptions.
One of those exceptions is
Tetris. The original
Tetris on Game Boy didn’t really have a story yet had this powerful almost hypnotic ability to make you want to play it. Having been born in the Soviet Union, I played it with a sense of pride back in the nineties.
By the by, has anyone seen the movie? It’s awesome. Having studied the story of
Tetris for many years, it always perplexed me as to why no film director had ever decided to make this unbelievable real life story into a movie.
Besides a bit of exaggeration and the usual attempt to make the Soviet Union look worse than it was, the movie is quite good and accurate. The bad KGB guy in the movie never existed though.
The only reason I mentioned
Tetris is because it’s actually connected to
The Talos Principle.The Talos Principle is basically a puzzle game where you have to gather tetrominoes; the same building blocks in the original Tetris game, albeit in
The Talos Principle, they're referred to as sigils which carry a profound significance.
The puzzles are solved in 3-D where you have to find your way through mazes and the like. It’s not so different from the aforementioned game by @late,
Portal.
Portal is even referenced to in
The Talos Principle several times through in-game Easter eggs, so the two games could somehow be connected. I have never played Portal though.
What makes
The Talos Principle so special though is the story. It's a sublime philosophical meditation on what it means to be human, and is the only time that I've ever seen the divide between atheism and religion bridged so elegantly.
It also explores in a most scientific manner the profound implications that would come about as a result of creating a legitimately self aware artificial intelligence.
The game begins with you waking up as a self aware android robot into a Garden of Eden like paradise. The rest is a mystery that I'll let ya'll figure out if you do decide to play.
Towards the end of the game I got a lump in my throat because I was so emotional. I was in tears towards the end of the expansion pack,
Road to Gehenna.
Road to Gehenna should be enjoyed by anyone who's spent enough time in online chat forums.
Road to Gehenna explores how an online forum can on multiple levels create a community of friends more sincere and more genuine than any sort of social relationship can in the outside world. Online, we have a true meeting of the minds, unfettered by cultural restraints, taboos and all the other social ills like class and the envy that comes with it.
In Road to Gehenna, you're once again an android robot sent to free a bunch of people born into bondage who's only social interaction throughout their entire lives has been solely through an online forum. The catch for freeing them is that they'll never be able to speak to each other again.
You remember when you told me about game theory @Politics_Observer? It's included in the game. The members of the forum perform experiments on each other in the form of game theory in other to research the amount of trust there is in the community. A conundrum appears mid-game whereby they're torn about whether to leave their prisons or whether to stay because game theory might imply that individuals are too selfish to function cohesively and effectively as a society.
It's really powerful stuff.
I consider this game a supreme masterpiece that deserves a spot in the louvre amongst humanity's greatest artistic achievements.
Anyone here who has played this game and agrees with me, or am I alone in the world?