What is Game Play?
 

Just something I've been pondering.. for the last 2 minutes, but we always tell friends that a game has good or bad game play, but what does that really mean?

I mean how do you describe game play? What is it to you?

Re: What is Game Play?
 

The core of a game. What makes it fun. Strip away all your fancy graphics, atmosphere, story, whathaveyou. If it's still fun when the characters are grey cubes in a nondescript world, that's good game play.

Re: What is Game Play?
 

Its what Too Human didn't have...

Re: What is Game Play?
 

I feel like this is a cutting-edge philosophy question, like back when the first philosophers dicked about "what is art."

For me, game play is that "thing" that takes something from being a video, picture, art, task, whatever, and brings in some interactive component that includes things like challenge, accomplishment, reward, success, failure, competition, etc.

The most popular games (SEE: NOT VIDEO GAMES) are built on fairly simple game play with basic things like winning/losing, risk/reward, competition.

Looking at a picture is not a game. Looking at a picture with a friend and seeing who can find something first is. Especially if there is pie at the end. Seriously, fuck all you cake-eating pie haters. :D

Re: What is Game Play?
 

Bam!

Re: What is Game Play?
 

Now let's see if I can come up with some categories...

A. Control. How do you steer your character/car/environment? Is it responsive, is it stiff? How many buttons do you need? Frustrating or fun?
B. Possibilities. How many stuff is there to do? Does it get repetitive fast, or does it entertain you for a long time?
C. Rewards. Why would you do the stuff you can do, what's the payback?

Let's take Super Mario Galaxy 2 as a good example.
Controls are simple and tight.
There are a lot of possibilities and different playstyles.
You get to see a new pretty world if you complete the level. You also progress through the story (but it was way to complicated for me personally).

Disaster: Day of Crisis (the Wii game you never got in America) as a bad example.
Controls are sloppy and annoying.
Not much to do, very little action going on.
The rewards were way too slow and small.

Want to add a category?

Re: What is Game Play?
 

I don't think I would have gotten very far in Portal if I was promised pie at the end. Pies are for charts, not eating.

Re: What is Game Play?
 

Pie is a distillation of the best parts of cake. Cake is beer, pie is whiskey. Cake is wine, pie is cognac. Cake is the beginning of something wonderful. Pie is simply wonderful.

/debate

Re: What is Game Play?
 

The thing is, cake is always good. Pie is grab bag. If someone offers you pie there's a very good chance it won't be to your liking. And say you bite into a pie expecting it to be strawberry and turns out to be meat. You can eat cake without fear.

Yay for derailing thread.

Re: What is Game Play?
 

Sir, your definition of "good" is troubling at best. Cake is never "good", it is edible and sweet. If given the choice of cake, pie, or any other desert, the correct answer is pie or any other desert. Cake is eaten because cake is better than no cake, just as having an old Yugo is better than having no car. Given the choice, you would take a better car, but you due to poor live choices you are left with cake. Ergo, cake is for losers.

And derailing threads is fun.

Re: What is Game Play?
 

Sir, your definition of "good" is troubling at best. Cake is never "good", it is edible and sweet. If given the choice of cake, pie, or any other desert, the correct answer is pie or any other desert. Cake is eaten because cake is better than no cake, just as having an old Yugo is better than having no car. Given the choice, you would take a better car, but you due to poor life choices you are left with cake. Ergo, cake is for losers.

And derailing threads is fun.

Re: What is Game Play?
 

I like cake.

Re: What is Game Play?
 

That's bogus. I've had some terrible cakes. In fact I've had so many terrible cakes that I no longer eat cake, ever. If someone is like "Hey dessert time!"

and I'm like "Oh hey what did you make?!" and they're like "OMG CAKE!!!"

I'm like "Oh... Really? Sounds awesome but... I'm super stuffed and can't eat another bite. Maybe we can have cake later?!"

Really though, I'm just not going to eat that cake. It's cake and that's disgusting.

I mean really, the only thing cake has over Pie is that you can't do this with Pie:



However you will never get this out of a cake:



Just look at that fucking perfection. It will taste so good too. Mmm... Pie.

Re: What is Game Play?
 

What sort of fool would prefer a dessert that can't be molded into the Millennium Falcon? A bakery lives or dies on their sale of starship shaped treats. The Queen of England eats a cake in the shape of the Starship Enterprize every single night as Patrick Stewart seductively reads off the ingredient list until she reaches orgasm.

Re: What is Game Play?
 

The gameplay of derailing a thread is simple, diverse and very rewarding.
Sorry, off-topic. Go on.

Re: What is Game Play?
 

Why are the best celebrations always marked with cake? Because its the best. I'm williing to bet Prof that you and your wife didn't cut a wedding pie.

Re: What is Game Play?
 

Ahh but a lesser know fact is that it is a different piece of pie that Patrick Stewart feeds her every night that tips her over the scale into said orgasm.

The cake is just to show that she has tons of money, though not as much money as JK Rowling, the true Queen of England.

Re: What is Game Play?
 

Harry Potter was actually a ruse by which Rowling was able to bypass the Anti-Anti-Pie Association. True eaters of the cake can easily decipher the code hidden within the books and read her anti-pie manifesto in all its glory.

Re: What is Game Play?
 

I believe cake is referenced several times in the Potter books, not sure about pie, I'm sure its there.

And I like that this thread continues the only long-lasting feud on GT.

Re: What is Game Play?
 

I do believe that a little food called "Sherpard's Pie" is Harry Potter's favorite food.

You know it's a pie, made with lots of fun stuff including vegetables and meat (Lamb!).

Harry Potter in fact only eats cake because the house elves are too fucking lazy to make more pie, and they should be severely made to punish themselves all day.

Re: What is Game Play?
 

Cake tries to pretty itself up to make itself more appealing.


A pie can stand on its own knowing that it is amazing just the way it is

Re: What is Game Play?
 

In defense of cake



Also cheesecake wants to be so loved that it doesn't tell you its a pie!

Re: What is Game Play?
 

Show me a show on TLC called 'Pie-Boss'. Nobody would watch it.

Re: What is Game Play?
 

Cake requires frills, food coloring, and other heresies. Pie needs to only be pie.

Pies can be eaten for breakfast, lunch or dinner.

Pies can be savory or sweet.



I don't always eat pastry, but when I do... I eat pie.

Re: What is Game Play?
 

Just ask yourself this. "What do beautiful naked young ladies pop out of?" Cakes.

Re: What is Game Play?
 

You don't refer to a ladies nethers as cake do you?



It has and always will be pie

Re: What is Game Play?
 

Pie has crust. The portion infamously thrown away on numerous foods.

Re: What is Game Play?
 

Children discard the crust. On Pie crust is the most important part. This only reinforces pie's greatness.

If you cake-lovers don't think the crust is the most important part, it only shows your lack of taste. We pie-lovers consume fine champagne. Cake-lovers swill PBR.

Re: What is Game Play?
 

If you assume that cake is associated with weddings, and weddings are associated with wine, champagne, and the really good stuff...

Let me ask Prof, did you have Wedding Pie at your ceremony?

Re: What is Game Play?
 

I already asked that question. Look in the damn thread.

Re: What is Game Play?
 

Wedding cake is an ornament, not a true dessert. Most weddings you go to now have dessert... and the stale cake that no one eats.

Again, pie does not need ornamentation. Being pie is enough.

Re: What is Game Play?
 

To get this thread back on topic...

What is pie?

I believe this is one of the reasons I like cake more - even some of the more esoteric cakes like carrot cake still have a cake-like quality that makes them "cake". You can always tell a cake when you bite into one.

What about a pie makes it a pie? How can one say that they like "pie", when the varieties of pie are so large and different. Apple, rhubarb, key lime, butterscotch, chocolate, cherry, meat....

While most pies are superb, I tend to prefer cake since it's typically not as rich and can be enjoyed at any time, despite how full you may be.

I also like my cake plain without any sort of icing, though.

But, as a cake lover, I do agree that the crust is one of the best parts of a pie.

Re: What is Game Play?
 

What is the best cake?

Cheese... and that is a CUSTARD PIE!

/TOPIC

Re: What is Game Play?
 

Not once will you find the word "pie" on the wikipedia page for cheesecake. Are you claiming to know more than the all mighty wikipedia?

And if it was pie (which it's not) it's obviously embarrassed to be called such.

Re: What is Game Play?
 

I don't but Food Network's Alton Brown does...

It is pie. There is no leavening in a cheesecake. Instead, its heart is eggs, dairy and sugar, making it a custard, and it sits on a CRUST.

PIE!

Re: What is Game Play?
 

No, I just deleted that yesterday. :) I love wikipedia!

Re: What is Game Play?
 

Mister Professor, the definition of pie is basically anything on pie crust. That's like saying you like hamburgers because of the bread. What a silly notion. Silly I say! Silly!

Re: What is Game Play?
 

You say this like this is fact. If anything, cake is often not good on the basis that it is mandatory eating at events. Cake is expected at birthdays, weddings, etc., so it is not uncommon to get some dried out, crappy frosting, ass-cake.

Since pie is a selective desert, it is baked and served in much more methodical fashion. I cannot recall the last time I had a slice of pie and went, "oh damn, this frosting tastes like that nasty shit you buy in the baking isle at your local Jewel/Dominicks/Whatever store."


Considering that the demographic of TLC are people who are also attracted to shiny objects it only makes sense that the emphasis is on how the food looks and not how it tastes. Jeez even BaBzie feel into the trap. Little does he know that I supplied the cream frosting for his superhero cake.


Pssshhhh, spoken like a true Canadian. Pizza has crust, and New Yorkers, Chicagoans, and Fart Sniffers across the United States argue about crust all the time. We love crust. :p

And if we are playing this "other food game," we'll take pizza-pie and you can have crab cakes!

:D :D :D :D :D :D

Re: What is Game Play?
 

The cake is a lie. Portal tells us so.

Re: What is Game Play?
 

Taken out of context.

The lie is that if a particular cake which was promised is real or not.

Thats just weak political tactics.

By that logic I say that all pie must be bad because people only use it to throw at each other, and never eat it.