I realize that "dissing" Wikipedia is the "in-thing" these days, and I also realize that people have done it, even if about specific topics, better than I have. There are also other articles out there that deal with the issue. So I suppose I'm just going to add to them.
I have been leery of Wikipedia since its inception; you cannot expect a web-site (and I refuse to call it anything else; I definitely will not call it an encyclopedia) that allows anyone, up to and including users that don't even have to sign up for a free account name, to alter its content and expect much but chaos or mob rule. I shan't throw out such axioms as "most people are stupid", or "common sense isn't so common". I will, however, point to one simple truth: Everyone is different. Not exactly earth-shattering, I realize, but bear with me.
Differences in people means differences in paradigms, which means differences in perceptions--such as the perceived validity of a topic and whether said topic should be expounded or merely touched upon. What one person finds interesting and worthy of lengthy detail another person will not. That second person may even wonder why such a thing needs to be anything but barely mentioned in another section. Then you get into the archetypal "edit wars", the extremes of which have people editing and re-editing for hours, if not days.
Then you have, as others have mentioned, situations where someone works on something, perfecting every minute detail about it, only to wake up the next morning and find it ruined--or, worse, simply gone. That has made some simply give up on Wikipedia, and made others feel dejected, like their entire effort was a true waste. The problem is that Wikipedia isn't truly governed by mob rule--that would only help, as there would then be some sort of governing body in place, and thus some sort of structure and rules held to (that couldn't be altered by any random person). What Wikipedia is ruled by is barely-contained chaos, with only the lightest of structures. "Cliques" form and protect their own, while letting the other "cliques" go hang, for all it matters.
Even already believing all of that, I signed up for an account over a year ago anyway. It's one thing to dislike something on premise, but until one actually experiences something, it can't really be argued one way or another (within reason, of course). So, I'd spent my time learning the basics, altering articles, having "discussions" on edits, and so on and so forth.
I witnessed my cautions given form in ways even I had not imagined. Unless and until servers become incredibly expensive, there shouldn't be a need to delete anything. I refuse to believe that Wikipedia is really that hard-up for cash, either. It logically stands that such cannot be the case--if it were, there would be a harder "push" to garner donations, and there would have been other recourses pursued. As has been pointed out elsewhere, text doesn't exactly take up a lot of space; and if it really became necessary, just simplify the pages themselves and ditch the pictures.
On top of that, there is a notorious penchant for disregarding what is said when it is disagreed with. For example, let's say that Person A creates an article. Person B disagrees with its content on, perhaps, a factual basis. Person A refuses to concede and so either an edit-war starts, or others are called in and most say the same thing: "Compromise." I have a big problem with that--there are times when compromising isn't the answer. There are times where one side is clearly wrong, yet I have personally seen displays of what can only be called passive-aggression; better to concede the battle in order to, perceptually, win the war. Instead of conceding that one is flat wrong on a topic--of any importance--there is this overwhelming tendency to compromise on anything. That leads to at best misleading entries, and at worst flat-out lies.
Here's where I should come up with some "solutions" for how to fix the Wikipedia "problem". And as a matter of fact, I do have some ideas. For one thing, completely ditch the anyone-can-edit strategy. That's flawed. For another, specialize. I have seen some well-structured "Wikis" out there that focused on only one or two rather specific areas. By "specific" I mean things like for certain television shows, certain book series, and so on. Yes, they have their fair share of problems, but in my experience the problems are fewer and of a less-serious nature. Two people disagree, they go to a common source and work it out, sometimes with one side admitting error.
So, yes, specification would be a step in the right direction. In concurrence, there should be restrictions on just who can edit and/or how much they can edit. Borrowing heavily from Jason Scott, I believe that a B.B.S.-style system of "tenure" would help immensely. When a newcomer first signs up, they aren't allowed any editing, or perhaps only very limited editing. They are watched, and talked with, and over a period of time are given more and more responsibility and trust, until they come into position where they, then, can watch over newcomers, so on and so forth.
As it stands right now, everything-and-anything data collection with an anyone-can-do-anything mentality only serves to hamper what might otherwise be a really good project. The combination of, ceding to authority (per Eric Burns' suggestion), a tier-style format of users, and specialization of data-gathering would, I believe, produce a series of projects that people could generally and genuinely enjoy being associated with. As it stands right now, however, Wikipedia is a living testament to why groups of people working together need rigid, immutable rules and structure.
Until such rules and structure are in place, people like myself will turn away, shaking our heads for "what might have been".
Wednesday, December 13, 2006
Mediocre Gamers in Today's Video Game World
Does anyone remember when video games catered to the mediocre gamer as well as the "hard core" gamer? When you had different difficulty settings, and when you chose one you still got the full game "experience"? Examples that comes to mind are Spider-Man and Spider-Man 2: Enter Electro, both action/adventure games for the Playstation. You chose your difficulty and played, not missing a single bit of content. The difficulty changed the damage you dealt and received, and that was pretty much it. Other forms of how different difficulty was handled were things like how the A.I. of enemies were dealt with; an easier difficulty setting meant that enemies were, generally, dumber. You could sneak up on them more easily, for instance (even if the game in question wasn't strictly a stealth-based game), or could fool them more easily, or you could watch as the enemy blundered into a problem, or whatever else.
It seems to me that this sort of allowance for the differing skill in players started to end when the Grand Theft Auto series was introduced to the Playstation 2, starting with Grand Theft Auto III. When it came out, the notion of different forms of difficulty in game-play was handled in a rather new manner--just racing through the storyline was comparably easier than doing what it took to get the secret items, things like the "hidden packages". To be sure, the difference in difficulty between running around, getting secret packages, and the main storyline was a marginal one, and at the time it was seen as little more than somewhat intriguing.
However, that has led to the way modern games handle such things--which is to say, not at all. Modern games rarely allow for the mediocre players, instead seeming to cater to the players who grasp concepts instantaneously, who can remember complex button combinations with ease. Let us take a look into the history of another genre of games, the R.P.G. genre which has as its arguable most famous example the Final Fantasy series. As a quick overview of the genre, the player ran around, killing things or completing quests and earning experience points. Once a certain number of experience points were accumulated, one gained a level. Typically, gaining levels also meant gaining points in certain "stats", such as strength, speed, and so on.
Early on, almost anything could be met if one were of sufficient "level"; if you couldn't beat this-or-that enemy, then you would wait a while, earn a lot of experience points, and then come back and try again. Once you reached the fabled "maximum level" (usually, but not always, level ninety-nine), you could rampage through most of the game without much fear of meeting an enemy who could stop you.
Then things started to change. Instead of having to merely wait a while and gain levels, you would have to also master certain skills (usually by putting some form of points into them, earned in similar fashions as one earned experience points); if you didn't know such-and-such skill, you couldn't defeat an enemy who was only weak to that skill, no matter your "level". You could be maximum level, but if you didn't have a specific skill, that level, and all it enhanced on your character(s), was nearly useless.
This was also seen as little more than somewhat intriguing. After all, all a player needed was, really, time, and they could have the skill mastered. Really, about all it did at first was add on more time to the playability of a game, which wasn't seen as a bad thing.
Things started to change further, however. In addition to needing to know what skill was going to be useful, one needed to have a sense of tactics. It was no longer a matter of having the patience to gain levels and master skills. R.P.G. games were evolving to need the player to have a sense of what skill to use, when, and for how long. It was no longer enough to know that <this> enemy was weak against <that> skill; now <this> enemy was weak to <that> skill, but only in certain circumstances--and what those circumstances were was often the result of specific things the player needed to do.
Another result in this change of perception toward difficulty is a change of perception. Where, once, games had said you did a good job and suggested that, next time, you might wish to try playing on a higher difficulty setting, now they seemingly taunt players. I refer to the rare game that even has a difficulty selection; these games usually have the easiest setting called "kid mode" or some similar, implying that the sort of player who needs this is little better than a small child. Early games that used this sort of label managed to get away with it--and at the same time, to insult players--by "suggesting" that the setting was best for young children, and/or those inexperienced in the game's genre (or video games in general).
Look at modern games, and you will see that it is the very, very rare video game that has a difficulty setting and allows a player, no matter the setting, full access to the "full experience". Look at the modern games, and you will find that the mediocre player is all but laughed at. After completing some video games, players who played on easier settings will be taunted and told that, if they wish to "prove themselves", they need to play on a higher setting.
Further, in the games that "hide" things--items, messages, whatever--upon completion they will be told that they didn't really get the "full experience" because they didn't get such-and-such items. It is becoming increasingly difficult, however, to obtain these items; many times, lately, some items can only be obtained once, in an all-or-nothing situation--and I for one increasingly find that items are hidden in such a way where you nearly literally have to know how to obtain them beforehand in order to obtain them.
In another post, I will mention the possible effects this sort of thing has on creating a "gaming community", but for now let me keep to the effect it has on the mediocre gamers. It makes the mediocre gamers feel like they are, somehow, inexplicably "less" of a gamer for not being able to obtain the "secrets", and what kind of a message does that send? Not a very good one, I say.
I think there needs to be a return to allowance for the mediocre gamers. I think that, while games catering to the "hard core" gamers are just fine, there also needs to be a selection of video games for the mediocre gamers that doesn't make those players feel insulted. Mediocre players shouldn't have to be relegated to the hand-held systems' effectively "dumbed-down" games because the "main" games were designed to be too difficult (and there is a major difference between "difficulty" and a "challenge", which I'll get to in another post).
That, I think, will only help the makers of video games. If they did that, if they published games that allowed for a scale of player skill, I believe that they would enjoy more of a following of players. As it stands right now, with all of the negative news about the various consoles, the mediocre gamers don't have much incentive to wade through the console-side nonsense. For every video game that offered a "full experience", no matter the player's skill, I believe that the publishers would find players in fact wading through the nonsense to play those games.
Unfortunately, however, I do not foresee such a thing in the near future. I can, however, hope.
It seems to me that this sort of allowance for the differing skill in players started to end when the Grand Theft Auto series was introduced to the Playstation 2, starting with Grand Theft Auto III. When it came out, the notion of different forms of difficulty in game-play was handled in a rather new manner--just racing through the storyline was comparably easier than doing what it took to get the secret items, things like the "hidden packages". To be sure, the difference in difficulty between running around, getting secret packages, and the main storyline was a marginal one, and at the time it was seen as little more than somewhat intriguing.
However, that has led to the way modern games handle such things--which is to say, not at all. Modern games rarely allow for the mediocre players, instead seeming to cater to the players who grasp concepts instantaneously, who can remember complex button combinations with ease. Let us take a look into the history of another genre of games, the R.P.G. genre which has as its arguable most famous example the Final Fantasy series. As a quick overview of the genre, the player ran around, killing things or completing quests and earning experience points. Once a certain number of experience points were accumulated, one gained a level. Typically, gaining levels also meant gaining points in certain "stats", such as strength, speed, and so on.
Early on, almost anything could be met if one were of sufficient "level"; if you couldn't beat this-or-that enemy, then you would wait a while, earn a lot of experience points, and then come back and try again. Once you reached the fabled "maximum level" (usually, but not always, level ninety-nine), you could rampage through most of the game without much fear of meeting an enemy who could stop you.
Then things started to change. Instead of having to merely wait a while and gain levels, you would have to also master certain skills (usually by putting some form of points into them, earned in similar fashions as one earned experience points); if you didn't know such-and-such skill, you couldn't defeat an enemy who was only weak to that skill, no matter your "level". You could be maximum level, but if you didn't have a specific skill, that level, and all it enhanced on your character(s), was nearly useless.
This was also seen as little more than somewhat intriguing. After all, all a player needed was, really, time, and they could have the skill mastered. Really, about all it did at first was add on more time to the playability of a game, which wasn't seen as a bad thing.
Things started to change further, however. In addition to needing to know what skill was going to be useful, one needed to have a sense of tactics. It was no longer a matter of having the patience to gain levels and master skills. R.P.G. games were evolving to need the player to have a sense of what skill to use, when, and for how long. It was no longer enough to know that <this> enemy was weak against <that> skill; now <this> enemy was weak to <that> skill, but only in certain circumstances--and what those circumstances were was often the result of specific things the player needed to do.
Another result in this change of perception toward difficulty is a change of perception. Where, once, games had said you did a good job and suggested that, next time, you might wish to try playing on a higher difficulty setting, now they seemingly taunt players. I refer to the rare game that even has a difficulty selection; these games usually have the easiest setting called "kid mode" or some similar, implying that the sort of player who needs this is little better than a small child. Early games that used this sort of label managed to get away with it--and at the same time, to insult players--by "suggesting" that the setting was best for young children, and/or those inexperienced in the game's genre (or video games in general).
Look at modern games, and you will see that it is the very, very rare video game that has a difficulty setting and allows a player, no matter the setting, full access to the "full experience". Look at the modern games, and you will find that the mediocre player is all but laughed at. After completing some video games, players who played on easier settings will be taunted and told that, if they wish to "prove themselves", they need to play on a higher setting.
Further, in the games that "hide" things--items, messages, whatever--upon completion they will be told that they didn't really get the "full experience" because they didn't get such-and-such items. It is becoming increasingly difficult, however, to obtain these items; many times, lately, some items can only be obtained once, in an all-or-nothing situation--and I for one increasingly find that items are hidden in such a way where you nearly literally have to know how to obtain them beforehand in order to obtain them.
In another post, I will mention the possible effects this sort of thing has on creating a "gaming community", but for now let me keep to the effect it has on the mediocre gamers. It makes the mediocre gamers feel like they are, somehow, inexplicably "less" of a gamer for not being able to obtain the "secrets", and what kind of a message does that send? Not a very good one, I say.
I think there needs to be a return to allowance for the mediocre gamers. I think that, while games catering to the "hard core" gamers are just fine, there also needs to be a selection of video games for the mediocre gamers that doesn't make those players feel insulted. Mediocre players shouldn't have to be relegated to the hand-held systems' effectively "dumbed-down" games because the "main" games were designed to be too difficult (and there is a major difference between "difficulty" and a "challenge", which I'll get to in another post).
That, I think, will only help the makers of video games. If they did that, if they published games that allowed for a scale of player skill, I believe that they would enjoy more of a following of players. As it stands right now, with all of the negative news about the various consoles, the mediocre gamers don't have much incentive to wade through the console-side nonsense. For every video game that offered a "full experience", no matter the player's skill, I believe that the publishers would find players in fact wading through the nonsense to play those games.
Unfortunately, however, I do not foresee such a thing in the near future. I can, however, hope.
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