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It’s an Elephant

12/09/2010|Matt "Steerpike" Sakey|Editorials26
Home » Home » Editorials » It’s an Elephant
It’s an Elephant

As those who tap the forums already know, I had LASIK a couple of weeks ago. It’s kind of an amazing procedure. Totally painless, though you do feel… something, something unpleasant, but “pain” is the wrong word. It’s more like you’re aware of being sharply uncomfortable for a few seconds. Admittedly the smell of your own burning eye flesh is disconcerting, but it doesn’t hurt.

For the next eight hours after surgery, though, your eyeballs feel like they’re being rolled in a slurry of sand and lemon juice. A great, noble, self-sacrificing friend of mine took me to the surgery, then took me home, then narrated a game of Civilization V to me (I’d been told not to open my eyes) while I fidgeted and growled and pawed at my liberally running eyes as they lay protected beneath the silly plastic shields they’d made me wear.

Next day I could see. My eyes itched a little, like having slightly dry contacts in, but I could read license plates down in the parking lot from my condo’s balcony, and looking through my old glasses was like putting cotton in front of my eyes. We’ll call that Day One. Best vision ever. Day Two, pretty much the same. Day Three was Thanksgiving and I was so bloated on food and booze that I couldn’t really see anyway, though I was able to find the pumpkin pie.

Day Four things started going downhill, and they’ve been on a slippery slide ever since. Turns out a reaction to the anti-inflammatory steroid eyedrops has caused the pressure in my eyeballs to rise like a billion times higher than it is supposed to be. Today at the surgeon’s office, they gave me new drops to reduce the pressure. This was an immense relief to me, not because I was in pain or anything, but because the way they were going on about the pressure in my eyes, I thought the things were about to burst right out of my head and splatter across the far wall, or that they’d use giant needles to slurp out the extra eye juice or something. Just drops though.

This isn’t some argument against LASIK; nothing like that. I’m sure that they’ll get this problem sorted out and my vision will be excellent. If they don’t, I’ll soon be so god damned rich that I’ll be able to buy other people to BE my eyes. I won’t even keep their bodies, I’ll just take their eyes and carry them around in a big sack.

All the same, I can see fuck-all right now. And I wanted to play New Vegas tonight. I’m going to try, but it will be hard. This got me thinking about the old story of three blind men asked to describe an elephant – one touches the trunk and says it’s a snake, one touches the leg and says it’s a tree… I can’t remember what the third one touches. Point is they don’t realize it’s an elephant.

I always wondered what the elephant was doing during this process. They are ornery creatures and I can’t see one (literally right now, but figuratively in this argument) standing there patiently while three blind dudes feel it up.

Beloved, venerated game designer Warren Spector surprised me today. Spector has been so long in this industry, and knows it so well, that I’d never have expected this from him: he fell back on the very last, most desperate response to bad press and said “critics don’t understand” his latest work, Epic Mickey for the Wii. Warren, Warren, Warren.

Dude, I will buy any game you work on (except this one, because I don’t have a Wii), but if it’s poorly received don’t group yourself in with the Hydrophobia developers of the world and accuse critics of misunderstanding. Critics are paid to understand. Don’t fall back on the old “keyboard and opinion” argument. Like you, Warren, most serious critics have forgotten more about games than most people will ever know. You’re a fucking genius. I could talk to you for hours. I have talked to you for hours. Discussing games and the industry with you is like geek heaven, without the shame. Gaming needs you, and if Epic Mickey is suffering a little in the ratings, don’t use the “it’s misunderstood” chestnut. Especially don’t do it when all critics are complaining about the same thing: a bad camera.

In games, a camera is a device that allows us to see. We depend on it. If the camera is bad, if we can’t see what we need to see, we can’t play the way we want to. And yet despite this, “bad camera” is among the most common complaints leveled at games.

Since I am currently practically blind, I find myself especially sensitive to that criticism. It’s sad to me that Epic Mickey has stumbled for such a pedestrian reason. I could have told you it wouldn’t sell (I’m wrong about some things, but this one I was sure on). It’s a Disney game starring Mickey Mouse. The addition of Warren Spector and his team at Junction Point mean that it’s very still water that runs very deep, very deep indeed – but people will see it as a Mickey Mouse game. But even knowing that I’d have encouraged its production. Warren Spector loves old cartoons; he did his Master’s thesis on them. And from what I hear, the game does a great job of weaving together a truly dark story about forgotten things and cherished memories, without actually un-Disneyfying it to the point that the overlord corporation would hit the brakes. So the fact that a sluggish camera is putting Epic Mickey in the hurt locker just isn’t fair. I wish it were possible to struggle past that bad camera and see the decision points, the moral quandaries, the characterization of the classic hero that’s been so lovingly crafted into the game.

But you can’t. A video game is an elephant, not a trunk, a leg, and a whatever. It’s something that you need to see, see the whole of, to recognize. Even those who wind up loving Epic Mickey for its Warren Spectorness (and remember, I haven’t played it, I’m going on reviews and what I know of the developer) will still have to acknowledge that it’s an imperfect elephant. If we could touch a video game and feel only the trunk, or only the leg, perhaps we could overlook such things. But more than any other medium, this is one elephant where you can’t be blind to any part.

Email the author of this post at steerpike@tap-repeatedly.com.

02/07/2012 Matt "Steerpike" Sakey

About the author

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Matt "Steerpike" Sakey

Tap-Repeatedly Overlord Steerpike is a games industry journalist and consultant. His earliest memories are of video games, and hopes his last memories will be of them as well. He’s a featured monthly columnist with the International Game Developers Association, and is internationally published in an assortment of dull e-Learning texts and less dull gaming publications. He also lectures on games at various universities.

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26 Responses to It’s an Elephant

  • Avatar
    Mike Gust 12/09/2010

    Ouch. Oh my god, fucking hell Steerpike. Your eyeballs are swelling up?

  • Avatar
    Matt "Steerpike" Sakey 12/09/2010

    They’re like basketballs!

    Not really. They look and feel like perfectly normal eyes. But man, lemme tell you, the scene they made at the surgeon’s office this morning was something to behold.

    NURSE: Your pressure is really high.

    ME: My blood pressure? You just poked my eye.

    NURSE: No, the pressure inside your eyes.

    ME: Er

    NURSE: Let me get the doctor.

    DOCTOR: Wow, that’s pretty high. You must be having a reaction to the steroid.

    ME: I just thought that would make my eyes really strong (few people find me funny, but I try).

    DOCTOR: It’s not that kind of steroid.

    ME: Oh.

    DOCTOR: Stop taking it right away.

    ME: Well, I’m not… I mean, it’s a drop, I’m not… using it as we speak.

    DOCTOR: We have to get some other drops in you. Can you stay for an hour?

    ME: Er

    DOCTOR: Get me four doses of Blabahababibidol and four doses of Hiniminihinapinadol! One dose of each alternating every two minutes! Then take his pressure every ten minutes for an hour!

    ME: Er

    et cetera.

  • Avatar
    Toger 12/09/2010

    Steerpike, put your eyes back in your head! Seriously, I hope that the pressure works itself out and you’re back to seeing elephants and broad sides of barns. Soon. A friend had something similar when he had eye surgery to remove a bubble on his retina. Too much pressure, blah blah blah, different drugs. Things worked out.

    As to Warren, I don’t know him from Adam but I thought him an ass when I read that bit about critics misunderstanding Epic Mickey. I’ve played Epic Mickey and the camera is as bad as they say. I despise that fucking camera. It locks itself in the strangest places and refuses to move when I need to see where the hell I’m going. Or where I’ve been for that matter. I’ve had niggling camera issues with other platformers (oh, I forgot. He said it’s not really a platformer. Warren? It’s a platformer. Trust me.) but nothing on the epic scale of this game (see what I did there?). I want to play more, but the camera seriously frustrates me and that doesn’t make me a happy girl.

  • Avatar
    Finkbug 12/09/2010

    Great post. Love way you brought it around, though I’d’ve skipped the already past sell date hurt locker reference. Oh, and hope your eyes don’t explode. I like ya seeing the stuffs and reporting back.

    Always wondered why platformer is *the* choice for creative story work. It can’t be tight control of level design; FPS lives and dies by that. There is a brute elegance to the FPS: set degree of fish eye and done.

    Perhaps it’s dodging the “shooting” feel of FPS or third person shooter to hit a bigger market but for me the platforming of Psychonauts was a deal breaker. ‘Course so was the RTS of the next game… so I’ve no ideas.

  • Avatar
    Mike Gust 12/10/2010

    It would be an interesting study to count gamers who like platformers and those who like FPS.  Personally a platformer is a deal breaker for me, no matter how masterpiecey the game. Platformer games to me have always seemed like the little fascist acrobat in the circus of gameplay…the one who can swing through the air with the greatest of ease. While the rest of us have to work within the strictures of gaming and just pretend to high levels of skill. Platformers demands a certain level of motor control I don’t have. It pisses me off and puts me off.

  • Avatar
    Armand 12/10/2010

    Steerpike: I hope your eyes heal soon man, that sounds all sorts of scary!

    Mike and Finkbug: Are you guys saying you wouldn’t buy a game simply if it were a platformer? Or am I misunderstanding “deal breaker?”

  • Avatar
    Mike Gust 12/10/2010

    Armand, I would still probably buy it. I just would be unable to get very far, (Psychonauts being the classic example…I’ve bought it twice and never got very far because I can’t get the timing down) and then complain to lots of people who don’t care.

    Yeah, Steerpike, easy on the eyes.

    Hmmm, that didn’t come out right, did it?

  • Avatar
    Jarrod 12/10/2010

    Steerpike, how do you know your eyes look like normal eyes?  People could be lying…

    I haven’t played Epic Mickey, and I was dubious about the Disney game’s premise.  What I’ve seen of it on Youtube though, the story looks good, and fairly mature for a Disney production.  Shame if the camera doesn’t do it justice.

    Get well soon, Steerpike!

  • Avatar
    Meho 12/10/2010

    My God, Steerpike, you should not be playing games (I saw you on Steam the other day, actually playing New Vegas) OR typing your typically amusing and funny articles for T-R!!! I mean, save your eyes for something that makes you money, damnit.

    Also, does American medicine cure EVERYTHING through a combination of scalpel and steroids?? My God, that’s like Rob Liefeld’s been hired as a Minister of Health!!!

    More to the point, I was also sorely disappointed that Spector decided to comment back on the comments about the camera since, yeah, camera in Epic Mickey is pretty much what I have been whining about for the past couple of days. It’s bad. Especially in a platformer, you know…

    Other than that, hmmm, the storytelling… not SO great so far (and I am some four hours in or so). Deus Ex, System Shock or Thief this is NOT, I’m afraid.

  • Avatar
    Harbour Master 12/10/2010

    I am happy with my glasses, thank you. I know a few people who went in for lasers, and came out “adjusted” and were suddenly popular in parties. What that has to do with fixed eyesight I don’t know and suspect mental tampering.

    I am also Wii-less and unlikely to enjoy Epic Mickey’s camera.

  • Avatar
    Matt "Steerpike" Sakey 12/10/2010

    Thanks for the kind wishes everyone, you’ll be pleased to know that I was back in the surgeon’s office today and my pressure is now “twelve.”

    I don’t know what that means, lacking a frame of reference, but it was 35 yesterday. What the upper limit might be I can’t say, but the surgeon was so excited that my eye pressure was 12 that he brought another surgeon in to admire it. They stood there taking turns poking me gently in the eyes while looking through some light-emitting thing and saying “beautiful, beautiful.”

    It got kind of irritating. I know I’m beautiful. We’ve been over this. Even Scout says I’m easy on the eyes.

    As to platformers, I can understand the position of those who just don’t like them. If try as you might you can’t get the twitchy timing and reflexes down, playing would just be infuriating. It’s a pity, because titles like Sands of Time and Shadow of the Colossus are essentially platformers, but I can definitely understand the dislike.

    Any chance of a Tap review for Epic Mickey, Meho? We’ve been missing your wit on the front page and I’d love your extended thoughts.

  • Avatar
    Meho 12/10/2010

    I… I might actually chip in with Super Meat Boy review first as this game is actually more inspiring. And, hands down, a much better game. But let’s see.

  • Avatar
    Spike 12/10/2010

    Steerpike: I’m aching for you, but you will get past this.

    My Ex. has had incipient glaucoma for 20 years.  I say incipient because with daily eyedrops his inner-eye pressure stays at a level that the ophthalmologist is happy with.  In this case, 12-14.  Over the years there were a few times when the pressure was 18-19 and the doctor didn’t like that and changed either the medication or the number of drops per day.  Had you continued to have a pressure of 35 you wouldn’t have too many game-playing days left in your future.  At least not without some of the accessibility features most modern computers come with.

    This too shall pass.  It had better.  I don’t want to have to go spend time at some other gaming site, fantastic though they might be.  I’m loyal and lazy.

  • Avatar
    Gregg B 12/10/2010

    Those pictures hurt me. The top one, what film is that from? And don’t you dare put it in the banner contest.

    Remember Steerpike, if it all gets too much there’s always Vicodin…

  • Avatar
    Armand 12/10/2010

    I thought they were pics the doctors took of his eye. Maybe I was wrong.

  • Avatar
    Ernest 12/10/2010

    Here I was thinking of getting lasik too.

    Get well soon SP!

  • Avatar
    Ernest 12/10/2010

    Oh which reminds me I won’t tell you the story about the old lady whose appeal I handled recently; she had such a bad case of glaucoma that she lost her eye!

    So she sued her doctors; I’m convinced she won her case the moment when, right after her lawyer told her to take out her false eye, she said, “Can I put my eye back in now?”

    $12 million verdict.  Well-deserved.

  • Avatar
    Matt "Steerpike" Sakey 12/10/2010

    Gregg, the very top picture is from Un Chien Andalou, a 1929 silent film by Luis Bunuel and Salvador Dali. That’s the famous “eye slicing” scene from the beginning, where clever use of cutting makes it look like a young woman’s eye was slashed with a straight razor. In truth it was a baby dead cow’s eye. Still, it looked so real, everyone in my History of Film class jumped and screamed when we saw it.

    You can learn more about this pointless film that they inflict on students and that’s beloved of elitist assholes here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Un_Chien_Andalou.

    The second pic I found from Google, it’s part of the lasik procedure. It doesn’t hurt, I promise.

    Thanks for the info, Spike. With the pressure down and these new drops working their magic I’m not worried. And Ernest, don’t let my experience discourage you from lasik. Yes, there have been complications, but dammit, I can see.

  • Avatar
    Finkbug 12/10/2010

    Ouch. Hadn’t realized Dali’s insufferable moustacio twirling had invaded film schools.

    Armand, some of the best games are platformers– including the recent Continuity which I’ve praised to the skies–but for me they start in the hole and have to claw out. Always wondered if it was an accident of history (superlative Super Mario Bros. appearing early) they’re so prevalent or if there’s something about them that is inherently strong.

    Got some guesses about the latter but it’s probably a mix of both. It’s the question I’ve always wanted to dump on GDC as an attendee.

  • Avatar
    Matt "Steerpike" Sakey 12/10/2010

    Fink, if you go to GDC let’s hang out. I get lonely there and have no one to go to lunch with. I feel left out because I’m not part of a bigger group.

    Plus I can probably get you into the bigger parties. Booze! Booth tail! It’s like Sleazy Heaven!

  • Avatar
    Mike Gust 12/11/2010

    If you want an update of the eyeball slicing scene (and gee…who doesn’t clamor for that?) watch Lars von Trier’s latest DVD release, Antichrist. Not a bad movie as odd/artsy horror movies go but there is a scene with the same visceral impact near the end. Bastards! In both scenes part of me understands why they did what they did and part of me just thinks it’s juvenile.

  • Avatar
    Max "xtal" Boone 12/11/2010

    Debaser!

    Meho, what kind of game is Super Meat Boy? Is it a platformer? Or I guess 2D platformer, more accurately? There aren’t a lot of platforms…more saws and deadly white stuff (snow, salt, anti-meat-sauce?) really.

    I played Meat for about an hour on the Xbox (’twas the free trial) and I said to myself /this game is one heck of a smart arse, and it knows it too… but it’s kind of still adorable/. I thought about buying the full version for 8 minutes or so … then I resigned myself to the fact that it has eleventy-billion levels, and I am an utterly hopeless completionist, so that is just not a good combination.

    Alas, I think I liked Super Meat Boy for different reasons than most (but if that’s not true then that just means I’m very self-centered and pretentious). I see it as a social commentary on the success of independent gaming today, as if Super Meat Boy says to us all: I am a cube of meat trying to save a wad of bandages from an evil brain in a tuxedo in a man-suit thing … but I’m really not that ridiculous, am I? No, I’m the norm, and this is what gaming can be today: silly, hedonistic, meat-loving goofiness; I don’t have to be AAA, I don’t have to be a “summer blockbuster.” But I also don’t have to appear “retro.” I can just be meat. Super meat, actually. A Super Meat Boy.

    Whereas I think some others (disclosure: I’m referring to probably two dozen comment threads on Kotaku, IGN, RPS) are enjoying it because it reminds them of some halcyon-days childhood that never existed. I call bullshit on them.

    As I’ve admitted, I will never take on the full meaty adventure myself, but that’s because I am at peace with one of my many weaknesses, which is overlong, leaderboard-infused platformer (is it???) madness. It would fuck me over, the obsession that is. But I’m OK with that, and I can appreciate SMB from a distance, vicariously. Meat is totally /now/ and not /then/, and I pity those nostalgia mining fools.

    Now to sound all haughty and British: “Nostalgia is a bit shit then, isn’t it?”

    Mmm, yes. Quite.

    Maybe I should have saved this comment for your actual review, Meho.

    But I am un chien andalusia!

  • Avatar
    Meho 12/11/2010

    Hahah, maybe you should have written the review as well, because it seems you have a lot of interesting stuff to say about SMB even though you have barely played it.

    Yes, it’s a platformer. I mean, it’s a game where you negotiate the environment through running and jumping and have no chance of shooting anyone, so it’s a platformer. And, yes, it’s NOT any kind of retro-tinged exercise in nostalgia. It’s a fresh, inspired, cocksure game with awesome design, tight controls and a bunch of great ideas. Not as groundbreaking as Braid was and certainly not as pretentious, heh, but it provides one of the purest gaming experiences you will have this year (that is if you’re into punishing, reflex based, hand and eye coordination requiring gameplay).

    Also: “an evil brain in a tuxedo in a man-suit thing “. It’s actually BETTER than that. It’s a FOETUS in a tuxedo in a man-suit thing.

  • Avatar
    Max "xtal" Boone 12/12/2010

    You’re right, it’s a foetus! I took one look at it and thought of that ninja turtles guy, Krang, I think?

    But foetus is WAY better, haha.

  • Avatar
    Gregg B 12/13/2010

    I really ought to check out SMB despite not being particularly excited by it. It looks like a meaty N. Is that a fair comparison? N bored me stiff.

  • Avatar
    Meho 12/15/2010

    It’s a fair comparison. But SMB is much better. It has awesome level design, it’s extremely hard near the end and the art direction is unparalleled.

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