164

For example, I am terrible at Super Meat Boy, but just playing it has really improved how I play platformers and games that need faster imputs overall.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[-] Sterile_Technique@lemmy.world 16 points 1 year ago

This is admittedly kind of an oddball interpretation of "better gamer", but my personal take on that is being able to enjoy games more, as opposed to any measure of skill in playing them (and also understanding that there's a lot of overlap there, but humor me for a sec :P).

Perspective: currently in my mid 30s, peak gaming for my childhood was competitive shit like the N64's Smash Bros (which is the best Smash Bros. Fite meh.) or 007; fast forward to some racing type games, COD... the thing those all have in common was that the fun was in defeating your opponent, and any aspect of the game that wasn't competitive just kinda automatically felt not fun. Nor was getting stuck in a losing streak from playing against people better than me; or winning streak from playing against people who weren't challenging to beat. The window of potential to actually have 'fun' was shockingly narrow.

The game that kinda pulled me out of that was Halo CE. Right out the gate, it looked like any other shooter, and it had a rapidly growing community and the competitive elements that caught my initial attention. Fire it up, and it IMMEDIATELY stood out as something special. Up to that point, videogame music was pretty much exclusively simple digital sounding jingles, so the Halo CE login screen music hit like a fucking truck. I start up the campaign, and experience another first: the story had me hooked. Campaigns in shooters only ever felt like a tutorial you have to sit through to not be terrible in multiplayer, but Halo CE was like a full-blown movie, with each scene supported by a literal symphony.

It made me look at games differently - things like Zelda had flown under my radar, cuz what's the point if there's no multiplayer?? Not even score to compare?? Got myself a copy of OOC, and "...oh, that's why."

So, long story short, Halo CE was my gateway drug into RPGs.

More in tune with OP's question though, it kinda yanked off the blinders that stopped me from fully enjoying parts of some games, or entire genres of games.

...and that whole spiel is ofc relative to my subjective experience to the gaming industry circa ...idk, 1995+? So, Halo CE probably won't hit the same against today's gaming industry: but keep an eye out for games that blend elements you know you enjoy with material you haven't really dabbled into - you could unlock an entire new genre of awesome experiences.

[-] yesdogishere@kbin.social 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

a little bit like that for me. Early on, I always loved pvp. The question was which mmorpg would be worthwhile to me to invest the thousands of hours to grind a character. I didn't want to end up grinding up and hating the game, which would be a huge waste of time. Studying all the candidates, I realised I wanted some key elements which would assure enjoyability:

  1. It had to have a commitment to RvR open team pvp;
  2. The devs had to show that commitment, preferably playing the game themselves regularly;
  3. It had to have combat abilities like my favourtie pvp game, NWN from 2002, which meant tab targeting; and
  4. The game had to prioritise gameplay and fun pvp balance, over gfx.

Only after finding an mmo meeting all the the above, did I slowly play the game and over time, realised that a solid RvR open pvp game actually taught a player about real life and its challenges. How to win, how to lose, how to have the right attitude to challenges, how to endure tough times, succeed during good times, what it meant to defeat an opponent, what it meant to die in battle, and so on. Hence, I have been playing Champions of Regnum for more than a decade, and still love the game.

load more comments (3 replies)
this post was submitted on 06 Sep 2023
164 points (98.8% liked)

Asklemmy

43895 readers
986 users here now

A loosely moderated place to ask open-ended questions

Search asklemmy ๐Ÿ”

If your post meets the following criteria, it's welcome here!

  1. Open-ended question
  2. Not offensive: at this point, we do not have the bandwidth to moderate overtly political discussions. Assume best intent and be excellent to each other.
  3. Not regarding using or support for Lemmy: context, see the list of support communities and tools for finding communities below
  4. Not ad nauseam inducing: please make sure it is a question that would be new to most members
  5. An actual topic of discussion

Looking for support?

Looking for a community?

~Icon~ ~by~ ~@Double_A@discuss.tchncs.de~

founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS