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Polygons spicy take: Watching a video game is basically playing it

GymWolf

Gold Member
Wow I made so many world records.
good-boy-pooping.gif
 
Written by a girl gamer of course.
Her impression matches my experience.

“Many of my friends — most of them women — would rather fixedly watch someone else play games than play them themselves.”

I have yet to come across a man who would prefer to watch people play than play themselves. However, I have had several women in my life that clearly prefer to watch than play.

There may be something inherent in the games we play, or the way women process them, that leads to this. Maybe for women, it really is the same as playing it?
 

BlackTron

Member
In my opinion, when the person you are watching gets a trophy, so should you.

I mean it is literally the same thing.
 

Laptop1991

Member
No it isn't lol, your not in control of the game or view or anything, it's watching what another gamer does in a game, not playing it yourself lol.
 

BlackTron

Member
In a way, this take makes sense from a person who would never pick up a controller, who can only see a game in terms of eye candy in-between story and cutscenes. Since they don't actually play games, they would not see the purpose, value or fun in actually playing the game, or its challenge. They believe they are simply skipping the "busy work" and getting the experience of the game content that "matters".

But this was written by someone who played for an extent, then couldn't be assed anymore and watched the rest of the game. The only place this could possibly come from is wanting to feel like/say that you accomplished the same task without doing it and taking a shortcut. In other words, welcome to our present reality.
 

Laptop1991

Member
The comment is ridiculous. So watching Cuphead is the same as playing it?
Yeah, must be lol, gaming is getting worse by the minute with the nonsense they keep coming out with lol, i've only watched a few playthrough's like Gophers or Oxhorn's vids, but it isn't me playing the game, They are! lol, i've never played Cuphead either, real or otherwise.
 

Madflavor

Member
The girl who wrote the article is right though, and the same could be said for film. Just recently she played Forrest Gump and she got the high score for being a fucking retard.
 

Thaedolus

Member
Yeah I wake up every day feeling like an NFL linebacker because watching them play is essentially the same thing as doing it myself…

Anyway, idiot has an idiot take.
 
I can't wait for it being "gatekeeping" to wonder if someone actually played the game they're reviewing.

Anything to feel victimized by the fans of a medium, space and "scene" they're invading. It's been the same in various musical genres for decades. Mainstream journos arrive and demand thing changes to their clearly superior, open-minded tastes. Now all the actual fans are elitist scum.
 
If it’s a boring video game that might be true, but I don’t feel any enjoyment watching someone playing video games. I don’t get this whole concept…
 

DaGwaphics

Member
Does the author only play movie style games where you walk around choosing dialog options? I can see that experience being ruined by watching someone else play it.

In games that focus on gameplay the act of fighting off the hordes of enemies is the challenge.
 
If you actually read the article, it’s written perfectly well and presents a valid perspective. The problem is that the title of the article doesn’t represent the body of the article.

Everyone here poking fun at this or disparaging it is doing it on title alone, which makes sense, since the title is bullshit.
 

Osaka_Boss

Member
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Same people that probably use the Cuck chair

Watching your wife having sex with a stranger is the same as having sex with her, right, right?

Lmao
 

BlackTron

Member
Don't know shit about Star Wars but I've seen enough about the latest debacle into that universe to see that the fans who actually built the space for it to be able to exist are now villainized.

Sounds exactly like the music scenes I used to be involved in.

Actually we don't even get to be fans in disagreement, we aren't even fans at all. "Can't wait to hear what Star Wars "fans" whine about after the new episode! If they hate it so much, why not watch something else and let us REAL fans enjoy it?" I'm not paraphrasing, this is almost word-for-word stuff I see shoved on social media.
 

Minsc

Gold Member
Maybe cause I grew up playing some single players games with friends (like Link to the Past on the SNES, or FFIII ) where the experience was shared between watching and playing (aka taking turns on getting hit, screens, etc), you can definitely get some of the experience witnessing the game being played.

And for games which can be played systematically, covering 100%, like an adventure game or RPGs, very little will be different IMO. Sure, you aren't playing the game yourself, but you're seeing the same content you would be if you were, so the difference is pretty subjective. To some people, especially someone who's already played dozens of similar games, I personally don't think playing it yourself provides a completely different experience than watching it being playing in a similar manner.
 

Kamina

Golden Boy
Makes sense that skill-less people would argue that way.
Even though it is complete bullcrap.

So in essence:
“writer with zero experience in vidogames writes garbage about videogames”
 
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Trilobit

Member
I only watch Let's Plays of games I'm not interested in buying or playing, but the story might be interesting to know. If I notice that a game actually seems to be up my alley way I stop watching and put it on my wishlist.
 

Success

Member
Old man GAF really showing their age here.

I agree with the take.

Many games fall into the category such as walking sims and card games.
 

simpatico

Gold Member
For an article this bad, I'll click the author's name and poke around a bit. This appears to be the eighth article she's written this year for Kotaku. With a blistering output like that, I can understand not having time to learn to play the games you get paid to cover. The content of some of the articles here is.....shall we say le cringe.

I'll leave you with this.

 

Myths

Member
At best, watching Let’s Play all the way through might make you feel more a part of the experience than any other form of content (with the exception of VR I guess).
 
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