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UK: Charlie Brooker to host "How Video Games Changed The World" 2hr show on Channel 4

pulsemyne

Member
Great find dude, best quality rip of that advert I've ever seen :D

Obviously the game tune came first, with the definitive version being (naturally) the c64 iteration. I vividly remember first hearing it on a covermount demo of the game (maybe an issue of Zzap 64?) and I literally listened to it for hours.

It still provokes an intense emotional reaction in me to this day... maybe it was the odd placeholder text in the high-score table that really struck me and set the tone for my response. You can see it in the video here, although in the demo the bottom two lines were different:

"To Be In This World"
"Truly Disappointed."

@strangedopamine

A remix, but yes they did.

Actually the definitive version is the speccy 128k version and it had better sampled speech.
 

BGBW

Maturity, bitches.
Who would you have excluded?
That rapper chap called Lex Luther's Most Devious Trap. He was too insistent on talking about himself rather than videogames. Why do I care for that spot of self promotion he forced down our throats?
 

pulsemyne

Member
I disagree.

You are so wrong it's laughable. Where do you think all those people coding GTA in scotland cut their teeth? Nearly all of them started out programming c64's and spectrums. The British games industry has pumped out some of the best coders around and some of the most original games. It also produced some of the best games musicians around.
 

BGBW

Maturity, bitches.
People are just upset that they made no mention of the SNES Vs MegaDrive console war whose effects are still felt to this day.

You have to admit though that the show did kind of ignore the early 90s from a kid's perspective.
 
You are so wrong it's laughable. Where do you think all those people coding GTA in scotland cut their teeth? Nearly all of them started out programming c64's and spectrums. The British games industry has pumped out some of the best coders around and some of the most original games. It also produced some of the best games musicians around.

I'm not saying the c64 or spectrum didn't have an impact on games like GTA, but specifically Manic Miner. You might as well say that every UK game since then is due to Manic Miner if you're going to make that sort of leap.
 

fred

Member
Watched this last night and really enjoyed it. So glad to see Elite being given a good mention, it's number 1 in my best 5 games of all-time list. It wouldn't surprise me if I spent around a thousand hours playing that over the years.

I've been waiting for years for someone to release an Elite clone, preferably with online play and most importantly without micro transactions or subscriptions. Just have the game the way it was originally, start off in a bog standard ship and a few credits and get trading.
 

Zafir

Member
The lack of anything RPG is just baffling to me. Especially when Last of Us was brought up about bringing in emotion. I'm not the biggest fan of a lot of Final Fantasy story's but they've been doing that for years.
 

d00d3n

Member
I found this surprisingly entertaining, but the choice of games was weird. Even if you buy the argument that they were picking the most suitable games to narrate the changes the gaming industry has gone through (rather than the most original/significant releases), they could have made a fairer and more informative selection. I mean, how can a shitty spectrum proto platform game get so much screen time? Or the ridiculous inclusion of Angry Birds? At the same time, they completely omitted truly groundbreaking and influential games such as Super Mario 64, Zelda: Ocarina of Time and Resident Evil 4.
 

dc89

Member
Key titles missing

FIFA
Pokemon
Half Life
Halo
Goldeneye
Gran Turismo
Tamagochi/Nintendogs
Brain Age/Wii Fit
The Elder Scrolls
Sonic
Final Fantasy VII
Metal Gear Solid
Resident Evil

You've just prevented me wasting my time.
 

AssaTM

Member
He says right at the start that it's a subjective and personal list and we still get 500 posts saying what the program missed? literally in the first 5 minutes o_O
 

RickD

Member
I think he would be better doing a Game show through another medium, such as youtube or a podcast.
By being on TV It's always going to be watered down because they have a scatter gun approach to who they are aiming it at. They can't get too bogged down in the details because it'll turn off non Gamer types, but by doing that they are turning away Gamer types.
They either need to do it properly or not at all.
 

Zemm

Member
Just watched this, thought it was brilliant. I love that they had guests who actually seemed genuine, I know most of them play games so it was good to see the likes of Dara Ó Briain on it as well as the video game journalists/critics.
 

dr_octagon

Banned
I think he would be better doing a Game show through another medium, such as youtube or a podcast.
By being on TV It's always going to be watered down because they have a scatter gun approach to who they are aiming it at. They can't get too bogged down in the details because it'll turn off non Gamer types, but by doing that they are turning away Gamer types.
They either need to do it properly or not at all.

Nobody else is doing it (with the approach to inform non gamers) - having a documentary dealing with the history of videogames on television is a start. A podcast or Youtube show would cater for gamers and not encourage a wider disucssion. Having something on C4 means it's more accessible - there's nothing wrong with the format. It may not be perfect but how else do you reach a wide audience - they aren't going to search for a podcast / videogame of game history.
 

LTWheels

Member
This thread turned into 'why we can't have nice things'. Such stupid whining. It was an 1hr30 snap shot to sum up 4 decades of gaming, and it did a good job. The games it focused on not only had an impact on advancing gaming, but also had wider social aspects.
 

Alienous

Member
So, if anyone was watching still Channel 4, did someone catch the Playstation Button sequence in the ad-break during Homefront Homeland. I don't think I got it ...
 

Screaming Meat

Unconfirmed Member
Key titles missing

FIFA
Pokemon
Half Life
Halo
Goldeneye
Gran Turismo
Tamagochi/Nintendogs
Brain Age/Wii Fit
The Elder Scrolls
Sonic
Final Fantasy VII
Metal Gear Solid
Resident Evil

Considering the limited time the show had, you'd have to replace every game they mentioned with your list. Frankly, as obvious as their list was (except for Twitter and SOTC, the latter of which was a nice and worthy surprise addition) I think they hit the nail on the head.

I mean, is Sonic any more influential than Mario, the game it was purposely designed to rival? Are Halo, Golden Eye and Half Life really more important to FPS's than Doom, when they are built on a lot of the language it solidified? Is Brain Age a real rival to the influence of Tetris? I'm not so sure...
 

Zaibach

Banned
It was kind of weird hearing her Northern Irish break into a sort of American'ised tone. It comes from the 'people won't know what the fuck we're saying so we began to talk like this out of habit'-thing I guess. Gary Whitta was sounding half Australian as well.

I couldn't pay attention to what she was saying, I was distracted by her gigantic eyes. There were points I thought she was an anime character.
 

BosSin

Member
I just watched it and I don't think it's much of a stretch to say that this show is probably one of the greatest TV shows/documentaries about video games (even if the bar was set very low)
 

Zafir

Member
This thread turned into 'why we can't have nice things'. Such stupid whining. It was an 1hr30 snap shot to sum up 4 decades of gaming, and it did a good job. The games it focused on not only had an impact on advancing gaming, but also had wider social aspects.
So people aren't allowed to criticise now?

I don't see the issue with constructive criticism.

I don't think the program was bad and it gave good insight into how games have evolved over the years, but I can still be baffled by some choices that they decide to include. I just really don't get the inclusion of Last of Us when it didn't really revolutionise anything. ^^
 

s_mirage

Member
Key titles missing

FIFA
Pokemon
Half Life
Halo
Goldeneye
Gran Turismo
Tamagochi/Nintendogs
Brain Age/Wii Fit
The Elder Scrolls
Sonic
Final Fantasy VII
Metal Gear Solid
Resident Evil

How about:

Pitfall
Virtua Racing
Virtua Fighter
Daytona
Sensible Soccer
Syndicate
Shenmue
Star Control 2
Populous
Theme Park
The Witcher
Micro Machines
Tempest 2000
Need for Speed
Madden
PGA Tour Golf
Quake
Flight Simulator
Ultima
Yada
Yada
Yada...

Anyone can create a list of favourite/influential games that are arguably as or more important than the ones used in the programme, but isn't it really pointless to criticise their choices? A two hour show can only give the briefest of histories regardless of the examples they use.
 

agm2502

Member
Quick question, This feature 'The Last of Us' right? Does it have any spoilers for it in the show? I'm mid way through the game at the moment.
 

f0rk

Member
Quick question, This feature 'The Last of Us' right? Does it have any spoilers for it in the show? I'm mid way through the game at the moment.

Not specific spoilers but they show cutscene footage I hadn't seen before. It's really near the end though.
 

L1NETT

Member
This thread turned into 'why we can't have nice things'. Such stupid whining. It was an 1hr30 snap shot to sum up 4 decades of gaming, and it did a good job. The games it focused on not only had an impact on advancing gaming, but also had wider social aspects.

Fucking bang on LT.

Evidently I am a Brooker fan, and although this isn't his best stuff but it still was damn good considering what it was trying to do.

And to the inevitable they missed x,y,z game out people, again this wasn't the list of the best games ever but how the games which changed aspects of the gaming landscape and how they changed what people (including, SHOCK, non-gamers) thought about games or even broadened the appeal of games. Angry Birds is absolutely justified in being on the list, even if you don't think it is mechanically the "best" game.

Point is that some of the games on the list don't have to be necessarily amazing games to have a wider impact.
 
I mean, how can a shitty spectrum proto platform game get so much screen time? Or the ridiculous inclusion of Angry Birds? At the same time, they completely omitted truly groundbreaking and influential games such as Super Mario 64, Zelda: Ocarina of Time and Resident Evil 4.

How dare you! Why, without Manic Miner we wouldn't have GTA V today! tut tut
 
It was a program about how videogames changed society, not a list of the best games ever. Fucking deal with it.

And yet, not a mention of how the Japanese gov't asked Enix to release Dragon Quest games on holidays or weekends to avoid massive amounts of kids skipping school and salary men skipping work, nor of the global Pokemon craze which media trumped up at the beginning to nothing more than a fad.
 

L1NETT

Member
And yet, not a mention of how the Japanese gov't asked Enix to release Dragon Quest games on holidays or weekends to avoid massive amounts of kids skipping school and salary men skipping work, nor of the global Pokemon craze which media trumped up at the beginning to nothing more than a fad.

It's almost as if they had a limited running time.
 

BGBW

Maturity, bitches.
And to the inevitable they missed x,y,z game out people, again this wasn't the list of the best games ever but how the games which changed aspects of the gaming landscape and how they changed what people (including, SHOCK, non-gamers) thought about games or even broadened the appeal of games. Angry Birds is absolutely justified in being on the list, even if you don't think it is mechanically the "best" game.
Most people got this hence why most are questioning the lack of Pokémon rather than say Majora's Mask. I get they had to cover the whole span of history otherwise most of the show would be about the 70s and 80s were a lot of the conventions were born. However this is a discussion board and we are going to discuss what we thought about this programme both good and bad. I mean the only entry I truly questioned apart from Twitter was The Last of Us but only because it is so new that it's hard to really say if it will have a long term impact or not. Also they reasons for it was story and I'm pretty cynical when it comes to story telling in videogames.
 

Roland1979

Junior Member
Is there any way to watch it (i'm from The Netherlands)? Is there any version available right now and the web? And if so, can it be added to the OP? Really want to watch it.
 

dr_octagon

Banned
And yet, not a mention of how the Japanese gov't asked Enix to release Dragon Quest games on holidays or weekends to avoid massive amounts of kids skipping school and salary men skipping work, nor of the global Pokemon craze which media trumped up at the beginning to nothing more than a fad.

They made mention of the Government criticising games, Tom Watson (who is an MP) talking about headlines and age ratings. That is probably more relevant for an audience than what Japan did with a game most people haven't heard about.

Pokemon is important - we haven't forgotten it. Loads of games aren't mentioned, there wasn't any mention of the Byron report, hardware failures, security issues, tax breaks for game companies, bad working practices and so forth. This isn't the definitive programme about games - others will follow and it's about being inclusive when it comes to discussion (not just for gamers).

They mentioned Ocarina of Time and praised other titles. The focus on the old games was to show the origins and how it influenced the current generation of game developers. I thought it was cool - I haven't played Monkey Island and it was interesting to see how that fits into the history. People may have enjoyed it and learned something - without having played most of the titles they showed.

Angry Birds was a recent thing which people can relate to. They didn't ignore the significance of that. Just like how they didn't ignore Braid to reflect the emergence of indie games.

The Last of Us being on the list was explained. It reflects how the medium has grown up and can be compared to a TV series. Character development, writing and storytelling can be of a high standard.

It was always going to be difficult but many people felt they did a good job. They could have had an international focus or cover things in more detail but not enough time. You can't do it all justice and it was going to be a challenge. We are too used to seeing things through the eyes of gamers.

There's nothing wrong with saying what was bad either. I think it would have been good to have more focus on game culture (maybe not the Banderas gif). It did feel like a brisk and nostalgic history lesson in a C4 games countdown format - hosted by a white Laurence Fishburne. A few random game related anecdotes also thrown in. Did you know Salman Rushdie loved playing Mario?

Again, that is down to time constraints and a lot of things to cover. It may still have been a bit weird because gaming has its own language and may be alienating for those not familiar with it.

TL;DR - Not just for gamers, loads to cover, someone gave a stab at making a programme. Feedback loop about how games and certain people were not included. Gary Whitta has an Austalian accent.
 
Considering the limited time the show had, you'd have to replace every game they mentioned with your list. Frankly, as obvious as their list was (except for Twitter and SOTC, the latter of which was a nice and worthy surprise addition) I think they hit the nail on the head.

I mean, is Sonic any more influential than Mario, the game it was purposely designed to rival? Are Halo, Golden Eye and Half Life really more important to FPS's than Doom, when they are built on a lot of the language it solidified? Is Brain Age a real rival to the influence of Tetris? I'm not so sure...

The only issue I had, is that based on what they said about Call of Duty, surely it would been a better representation to show the migration of people from Halo 2 to Call of Duty. I mean Halo had the reputation of the sort of people they showed (minus controversial single player moments like in MW2).

I think it was good though, wasn't expecting it to be that good really also thought The Last of Us was a good inclusion as I think the heights its story hit will be something a lot games strive for in the future.
 

spirity

Member
What the fuck at this thread. This is why we can't have videogame stuff on the TV.

It was easily the best representation of gaming I've seen on mainstream tv in a long time. Perhaps ever. I may have rolled my eyes at one or two things but I'm not complaining, overall it was great. And Salmon Rushdie a gamer, who would have thought, hah. I hope Brooker does more.
 

dr_octagon

Banned
It was easily the best representation of gaming I've seen on mainstream tv in a long time. Perhaps ever. I may have rolled my eyes at one or two things but I'm not complaining, overall it was great. And Salmon Rushdie a gamer, who would have thought, hah. I hope Brooker does more.

Exactly and I think this point is missed by some people.
 

wildfire

Banned
Finally got around to watching this and it was excellent.

I'm unsure about the cultural impact of Parapa the rapper. I don't think it influenced Guitar/Rockstar series directly but I'll do some light research to see what rythm games predate it if any at all.

Twitter is bollocks. I don't get why they are trying to anticipate that or even "Last of Us" for that matter as highly influential.

Twitter is an actual valid form of communication and it has gotten too many people fired from jobs to view it as just a game. On top of it all, MMOs are essentially gaming's contribution to the world of how social media works.

Since they already mentioned WoW there was no reason to give credit to twitter which has inferior tools to WoW, just better accessibility. Facebook otoh was more cutting edge and would've made more sense as meta commentary on the gamification of society.

Heavy Rain should've taken the place of "Last of Us." There have been many games I grew up with that I would consider to be high quality cinematic work but none of them would have the depth of reactive decision making while still maintaining cinematic fluidity like "Heavy Rain." Last of Us, would never have been picked as the PS3 swan song if it wasn't for Walking Dead and Heavy Rain.

This show has made me want to play a whole bunch of games for the first time or again.

I never noticed that the Ghosts in pacman had different playstyles as well as personalities. It would be interesting to see if I can formulate strategies based on the position of the ghosts.

Doom was creepy as fuck. I wonder if it will still impact me now considering how terrible the controls are compared to games that soon came after it.

Now I have to play Monkey Island.

I don't know if I could tolerate Elite but I might give it a shot.

I was going to go on tirade about Pong not being the first videogame but they acknowledged that.



I feel like they could have mentioned RPGs more, both Western and Japanese - it seemed like sandbox got way more focus.

I can't believe you thought this was appropriate to say. The majority of sandbox games are RPGs.


Thank you

Meh. As a generic clip show it was a bit better than average but as a historical overview it was criminally terrible. Omitting the entire ST/Amiga era is an enormous slap in the face to an entire generation of British gamers and game creators.

The biggest irony is that as a show it was guilty of the exact same "gamification" bs it levelled at Twitter. Basically impact was measured in terms of sales not actual influence or innovation, (think number of twitter followers denoting significance) I'm sorry but you cant mention The Sims without at least referencing David Cranes "Little Computer People", or cherry-picking Street Fighter 2 despite one-on-one fighting games being around since the early 80's...

Parapa the Rapper.

Shadow of Colossus.

Besides, you are making the mistake of not realizing that for anything to have impact it has to have a large amount of exposure to begin with. The only exception are pieces of work so influential that they are imitated by the people in charge and their works become popular even though the original source is lost on the general audience.

Don't make such a disingenuous and snobbish argument next time.


And I've got to say, cherry-picking a female fighter to be the victim of that Kung Lao fatality was as cheap and tawdry bit of deliberate provocation as it gets.

Do a search on Kung Lao fatality. It's stock footage.
 
I can't believe you thought this was appropriate to say. The majority of sandbox games are RPGs.

You have a weird idea of what an RPG is if you think GTA and the majority of sandbox games are considered RPGs. I wouldn't even call them action RPGs. Or are you one of those people who says any game is an RPG because you play the role of a character, completely ignoring the design elements that normally define a genre?
 

Carl

Member
Thought the programme was great until the section about women in games. And number one ws stupid. But interesting programme nonetheless
 

Roland1979

Junior Member
Just finished it and thought it was quit good. Of course, there's always a few games you would like to got mentioned in some categories, but all in all it covered everything quite well. Also, Twitter is a game.
 

wildfire

Banned
Is there a youtube?



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y1dG-_n1flE

You have a weird idea of what an RPG is if you think GTA and the majority of sandbox games are considered RPGs. I wouldn't even call them action RPGs. Or are you one of those people who says any game is an RPG because you play the role of a character, completely ignoring the design elements that normally define a genre?


You have a very narrow view of what design elements define an RPG.

GTA is very much more action oriented but that doesn't invalidate its rudimentary economy, or its vastly superior overworld or having an overarching storyline that typifies RPGs and Adventure games.

It's certainly more of an RPG as opposed to Metroid or Minecraft and I would say most games follow the GTA mold than the 2 other highly notable open world games I mentioned. There is a lot of bleed through in the genres and would be a disservice to not acknowldge how game genres have influenced each other over throughout history.

More importantly the term sandbox games was popularized by the debate over MMO designs which argued over the merits of Everquest vs Ultima and Asheron's Call.

MMOs are dominated by RPGs.
 

Zafir

Member
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y1dG-_n1flE




You have a very narrow view of what design elements define an RPG.

GTA is very much more action oriented but that doesn't invalidate its rudimentary economy, or its vastly superior overworld or having an overarching storyline that typifies RPGs and Adventure games.

It's certainly more of an RPG as opposed to Metroid or Minecraft and I would say most games follow the GTA mold than the 2 other highly notable open world games I mentioned. There is a lot of bleed through in the genres and would be a disservice to not acknowldge how game genres have influenced each other over throughout history.

More importantly the term sandbox games was popularized by the debate over MMO designs which argued over the merits of Everquest vs Ultima and Asheron's Call.

MMOs are dominated by RPGs.
That doesn't make it an RPG.
 

Hasney

Member
Be nice if they gave Brooker a mini series focusing on games of each console/computer generation giving them an hour each.

Will never happen, but I think it would be a fun show.
 
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