Cinematics Are Killing Gameplay?

Howard Brown writes "David Rodriguez is a Lead Game Designer at High Voltage Software. His latest article on Buzzscope discusses videogaming's overabundance of cinematics, and how their misuse is taking us further and further away from what videogaming is all about." From the article: "I made it perhaps three virtual feet before managing to trigger another cinematic. Silently biting back a curse I again attempted to button through it, but those rat-bastard developers were bound and determined to have me watch their cinematic magic. Idly tapping the button, as if hoping that somehow the rules would change, I sat and listened as some NPC taught me all about targeting."

This was especially bad...

[British]

...in Tetris. Before you could play, you had to watch this little movie sequence on how the square-shaped Tetris pieces were taking over the land of Tetrisania and were oppressing the T-shaped pieces. Then you ran into the L-shaped pieces and their back story.

It's only going to get worse when the Tetris MMORPG is released. You have to talk to the RED L-shaped piece to go on a quest to defeat the evil 4-blocks-in-a-line monster, but get a magic item from the zig-zag piece first.

The shortest in-game movie sequences? pac man.

Re: Agreed

[Black Parrot]

> I could write pages, on this but I'll try to keep it brief...

Just don't stick in any movies.