I know I already linked to Slate’s annual downfall of game journalism convention yesterday, but I’m going to do it again. Why? Because when a pretentious asshat like Tom Bissell writes something like this, somebody ought to call him on it:
“…you’re dead wrong that “fun” is the point of video games. No, I say. It’s not. That’s a fallacy that grows out of this unfortunate etymological ensnarement the medium is stuck with. Games, for me, are supposed to be interesting or engaging, and can arrive there in any number of ways. But fun? Who cares about fun? This “fun” shibboleth is so often used to validate games’ overall lack of ambition”
Ugh, where to begin? The unnecessary use of Harvard vocabulary in order to sound extra-smart? (This, by the way, is a common battle tactic of smug pseudo-intellectuals in all walks of life) Or the foppish “No, I say. It’s not.”? What, are you an 18th century Duke now? Or maybe it’s just the dual points that one, games aren’t supposed to be fun, and two, fun and ambition are somehow mutually exclusive , both of which have about as much truth to them as declaring the sun green or Buffalo a prosperous city.
Maybe we were supposed to be too distracted by all the fancy talkin’ to realize what an insane statement that was.
