Sid Meier and the 48-Hour Game 58
MMBK writes "Sid Meier is possibly the most influential game designer ever, having developed the Civilization series, among others. This video documentary looks at his past while he travels to the University of Michigan for the 48-hour game design competition, which was hosted by his son."
Re:Not commercially meaningful? (Score:4, Insightful)
While it's an intellectual challenge, and appeals to geek curiosity, how many really meaningful, influential games were written in one of these contests?
This is supposed to be news for nerds, please hand in your /. userid. The correct nerd response to a 48 hour game competition is "that would be fun" and not "what is the point". Some people do actually program for their own fun and not just to give you an updated version of NetHack. Anyone playing the games that result from these competitions are not doing so to find the next big classic game, but to see what people can achieve in a short time.
Sorry to sound confrontational, but I can't understand why anyone could even think that this sort of competition should end up with some meaningful and influential game. This is the epitime of the original, true geek. The goal of the geek is the same as a mountaineer: you climb a mountain or solve a problem because it is there.
I once thought as you did (Score:3, Insightful)
I once thought as you did about Starcraft. I thought it was basically real time tactics and click speed contests. Then I watched some pro replays on Youtube, and realized how wrong I was.
The Starcraft community refers to strategy as macro, and tactics as micro, and it's widely understood that both are essential ingredients to play well. You can see games where someone micro's masterfully, but they don't have a big enough picture view of the game and get absolutely slaughtered.
dull (Score:2, Insightful)
I found the Civ games to be pretty dull derivatives of various UNIX simulation games, including some world and space conquest games. I don't think Sid Meier really deserves that much credit.
Re:Deadlines (Score:5, Insightful)
I've boycotted cookie-cutter games like that. Same with movies. Do you know how few filmmakers bother designing their own quarks and leptons and stuff? The lazy bastards think they can just fill an existing engine with art.