Comments for ZEITGASM

Comment on The Simpsons Movie/TV Show Comparison by Hypocee

Hypocee — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 20:15:50 +0000

On the other hand, ‘Simpsons did it’.

Comment on Teenage Spacekicks by Gmes

Gmes — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 03:40:08 +0000

aaah the teenage years, when everything seemed so much more important then it really was.

I must have missed Planetarion put reading your story I think that’s a good thing for the sake of me and my friends

Comment on Teenage Spacekicks by Infovore » Links for February 7th

Infovore » Links for February 7th — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 02:01:23 +0000

[...] Teenage Spacekicks "I think this is something that’s mostly forgotten about in games writing: for a lot of the people who play games, there’s not much separation. The games get mixed up with the same insecurities and pettiness that exist in real life and the experience is emotionally heightened as a result. Planetarion is forever imprinted in my memory entirely because of these arguments, and despite the immaturity of fighting, it’s heartening to think of gaming as such a direct extension of real world relationships and emotions." Some nice stuff from Graham Smith. I too played Planetarion for a while at secondary school too, although with my Quake chums, looking for something to be played in the working week, away from 2fort5. (tags: planetarion games school relationships social bickering ) [...]

Comment on Teenage Spacekicks by Rolo

Rolo — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 17:28:44 +0000

Played Planetarion a little, but never got into it that much.

Did really get into one called Space: Glory Through Conquest though. Similar to PA, but more complex. You could form an alliance consisting of 4 players who bordered each other.

Gangbangs and backstabbing were very common. And the galaxy threads in the forums always devolved into flame wars and bickering.

In the early days you could send ships to all your allies planets and then if the alliance leader dropped them from the alliance you could instantly wipe them out and takeover all their planets. I remember one Christmas I was going to be away from the computer for a few days at a critical time so I shared my login with an ally I had played with before and thought I could trust. Came back from my trip to find he had deleted my account and taken over my empire. I was able to convince a friend in a neighboring alliance to gangbang him out of existence though.

Very fun game in all, but high emotions because you would spend months building an empire only to see it come crashing down because of one little mistake or betrayal.

Comment on Teenage Spacekicks by Pod

Pod — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 14:20:36 +0000

Planteraion and TFC caused many a school-yard bickering as well
I think Plateraion died out pretty quickly with us all, especially when it went cost money to play. Whilst the slow pace of it was good for a sneaky log-in, it also meant the games went on forever.

CS tended to cause the most problems, but I didn’t play that as much so wasn’t involved in it all. But I remember intention TKing was rife amongst the scoolyard. Cue much name-calling.

Comment on Teenage Spacekicks by Ed Fenning

Ed Fenning — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 14:18:30 +0000

Games like this created some infernal bickering back at my secondary school too. It ended up in a weird system where the older kids would try and recruit as many inexperienced young’uns around them to wage war on the other older kids, whilst said young kids would scheme and plot together to overthrow the one they were working for. This lead to a number of people falling out (briefly) because of what had transpired in these kingdom/fleet/gangster managment browser games, wga.

Comment on Teenage Spacekicks by Pentadact

Pentadact — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 13:16:57 +0000

I, too, once gave a damn. I much prefer our attitudes today: if a game I’m invested in that much goes perfectly for me, I enjoy 1% of the time spent playing. If it doesn’t, every moment is stress, frustration and fear.

Comment on Teenage Spacekicks by Anton Gully

Anton Gully — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 11:58:57 +0000

“The game wasn’t just play. It mattered to us in a real and powerful way.”

Man oh man, that was a great write-up. I think over the past few decades I’ve lost the passion for games that I used to have. For me it was all about plotting about Starnet on Micronet 800. But we were all adults – you had to be to afford it back then. But the politics and the treachery were still real and I know it was personal for a lot of people, me included.

Comment on Teenage Spacekicks by The Sunday Papers | Rock, Paper, Shotgun

The Sunday Papers | Rock, Paper, Shotgun — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 11:39:02 +0000

[...] playing an important part in the game in the last 24 hours, writes about his teenage gaming with Planeterion: “At my Secondary School, for a few months at least, our teenaged politics was defined by who [...]

Comment on My Nesting Instinct by Samuel

Samuel — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 14:07:49 +0000

Yes, that’s a good point. Setting up a little homestead somewhere, naming it and such like would be rather nice. Someone should really make a mod. The only part of the Sims I could ever really like was building the home itself; my architectural quirks causing trouble later on, the extravagance of a grand piano that cost so much that I couldn’t afford a toilet. The mundanity of actually living my crappy life was what got me down.

Ah of course, I didn’t think of them! I haven’t played them myself – indeed I came shamefully late to the Half-Life series in general. It’s an interesting idea which perhaps isn’t played with enough; I like the idea of telling ‘small’ stories in a videogame, the sort of stories you might tell in a film. A game where you’re neither a messiah, nor a faceless squadie, but an real, ordinary human being in an awkward situation. I guess good old Chris Livingstone’s ‘Concerned’ looks at this from a comedic point of view.

Robin Hood IS sort of awesome. It’s very evocative, I think. It’s also like a version of ‘Commandos’ that actually lets you fight your way out if your ‘clever’ plan doesn’t work out. I would imagine it’s tricky to find though.