Humor in Games? 345
commiesubverter writes "Slate.com has an article up about humor in games. It's a decent summary of where the gaming industry has been and is going with its humor. From the article: 'Comedy is typically marginalized into background sight gags and interstitial cut scenes. Even games that generally strive to be funny incorporate humor into window dressing: In Grand Theft Auto, you can sow mayhem while listening to a mock-NPR that's broadcasting a roundtable discussion on violence.'"
Monkey Island (Score:5, Insightful)
Just like in reall life unfortunately (Score:1, Insightful)
Lucasarts Adventures (Score:5, Insightful)
Monkey Island (Score:1, Insightful)
Computer games are less funny because they're interactive, and that's hard to do for comedy.
Games are not funny (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Misguided article (Score:2, Insightful)
Sigh, youngsters nowadays are so deprived. You've never played "Monkey Island" I suppose?
Re:Lucasarts Adventures (Score:5, Insightful)
Who wants to see Mario do slapstick over and over? (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe the reason games are low on humour is because most jokes are only funny once or twice, whereas a game needs to be playable many, many times. If playing the game a second time is like watching reruns of Fresh Prince in Bel-Air, I'd rather not.
Of course, there is comedy that will always be funny, such as Monty Python, but who dares create a complete game hoping that all or most of the comedy will last?
The Incredible Machines and Day of the Tentacle are two of my favourite old games with lots humour. But I think the reason I still like them is because I haven't played them for a long time.
Games should be fun (Score:4, Insightful)
Comedy takes a certain mindset. You have to program the user with a setup, then redirect them to the punch line. That's a different plot than blowing up an alien mother ship or whatever.
Comedy is usually only funny once. By the time the designer has seen it for the six hundredth time, it's not funny to them any more. By the time the user has seen the gag a few times, they're bored with it. By contrast, I still pull out Doom 2 now and then.
Scripted comedy... no thanks (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe I'm just twisted.
I don't think traditional comedy will work in games... you tend to get in-jokes in games, which is ok because those playing the games will usually get it. Jokes that are scripted and get forced at you again and again as you replay, whilst they may have been funny the first few times, they almost certainly aren't after a few dozen.
In my opinion, scripted humour can not replace gameplay touches that allow the player to make their own fun.
Re:Misguided article (Score:3, Insightful)
Not any more (Score:5, Insightful)
I have seen some humor left but it is either background, in jokes, or specific. Case in point, alot of the quest givers in WoW have some funny stuff to say and the voice emotes are a riot but the game itself is pretty serious.
One thing that people fail to mention is the switch in humor in the games has worked. People are buying these games or subscribing to the serives in record numbers even in this declining economy. Weither or not any of us agree with humor in games in its current incarnation it moot really. Pander to the lowest common denominator and make lots of money. Sad but true.
Re:No One Lives Forever (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Lucasarts Adventures (Score:3, Insightful)
There are of course some games like 'DeusEx' or 'Beyond Good&Evil' which manage to make a good cross between adventure game elements (dialogs, use of inventory, walking around at your home with being threatend by monsters, etc) and action elements, however its kind of sad that there are not more of such games around. The gaming world has really lost a lot after the dead of the adventure genre and only slowly the elements they provided are coming back into the games world.
Slapstick, FPS-style (Score:3, Insightful)
Sadly, I always sucked at the funniest games - even Monkey Island had me reaching for a walkthrough every ten minutes or so, because while the game is brilliant, it's a little *too* brilliant for me to solve half the puzzles on my own. And being frustrated, or "cheating" are not so much fun even when you can appreciate the game's humour.
Space Quest! (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Games are not funny (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Misguided article (Score:3, Insightful)
Frankly, one could make a GTA with all cut-scenes remade as comedy, not gangsta/mob films, but they they would be so out of sync with the gameplay itself. Jokes are something you create, not something that emerges from the gameplay (unless you are talking about "once-in-a-while" accidental funny moments that could happen even in Quake).
So a comedy game requires that you script it from the beginning to the end and that no traditional gameplay is possible. Because if you allow driving a car in a comedy game, you need to make it funny too, regardless of where you go. If you don't, there will be conflicting expectations from the gamer - do I want the driving to be cool (then why do I need all the jokes) or do I want it to be funny (then someone needs to create a lot of them)?
Re:Monkey Island (Score:5, Insightful)
P.S. For all the geeks with a Pocket PC (what self-respecting geek is without one?), there's ScummVM ( http://www.scummvm.org/downloads.php ), which I've been using for MI 1-3 and great old games like DOTT (Day of The Tentacle for the newbie geeks). I highly recommend it.
Unscripted is the best comedy (Score:4, Insightful)
What do you bet a producer somewhere is reading this and saying "A-ha! If unscripted comedy is funny
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:This would be fun.. (Score:4, Insightful)
That's OK. They'll come out with a special Eurepean version where you run over Jews. It'll be a big seller in France.
Go ahead. Accuse me of generalizing about whole nations based on the bigoted words of a few. I dare you.
Sierra's Space Quest (Score:5, Insightful)
The games were also very self referential. In one game (SP3) you had to save thinly veiled versions of the two guys who wrote the game. In another (SQ4) you travelled back in forth in time within the Space Quest series jumping from the original game into a game that hasn't yet been made like Space Quest 14).
My favorite line came from a moment when you asked to "get" a ladder and the game responded. "You get the ladder and put it in your pocket... Ouch."
Ah, the memories. That's some good abandonware.
Re:Lucasarts Adventures (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Games are not funny (Score:4, Insightful)
One reason that those old lucasarts adventures were so "successfully funny" was IMHO that there was no dead and no death end in the game. Whatever you did/tried, you couldnt die, and so you would check out cool stuff plus didnt have to endure the same stuff again and again...
King's Quest (Score:3, Insightful)
What about Worms? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Games should be fun (Score:5, Insightful)
Good comedy is not funny just once. How often will you throw in a comedy into the vcr/dvd you've seen a hundred times and laugh just as hard as you did the first time? If it was well written and done write, you'll do it every time. Most games do not fall into the well written category.