Space Invaders

Somehow in class Friday we managed to avoid the greater debate of video game violence, where the line is drawn, and how much video game violence affects youth violence. If you spend enough time talking about video games the topic eventually comes up, and maybe at some point we'll discuss it, but I worried about the recent shooting in Illinois affecting that kind of talk.

It seems kind of quaint that not so long ago Space Invaders had to be tailored specifically to avoid human vs. human combat. I remember spending a lot of time in middle school (around the N64/PSX generation) just dying waiting for the day when graphics were realistic enough to be on par with blockbuster Hollywood violence. I guess we're pretty close now, with games like Gears of War letting you take a chainsaw to your enemy and watch the blood spray all over the camera.  read more »

"Rise of the Video Game" introduced Space Invaders as a successor of "Pong" in the video game market, and the very first experimentation with a fantasy setting: invading aliens and the defense against. While the premise of Pong was relatively simple (two people playing a highly simplified, symbolic, pixelated table tennis), a "story" and "discourse" space still existed, but wasn't at all elaborate and dependent almost entirely on the player/viewer's imagination. Space Invaders is similarly minimalistic, although out of necessity, given that game technology had not yet evolved to become a diverse storytelling toolset. Props were limited to simple, often monochrome, pixels and a game play established upon basic, simple premises.  read more »

I have never really been much of a gamer. I enjoy the occasional game of Madden or maybe a quick season of Nazi killing with Call of Duty, but other than that I have never really gotten too much into video games. However, that class has changed that… in a way. While I still don’t play video games on a regular basis, I am getting more out of video games, particularly the ones that have more of a meaning than scoring touchdowns.
In particular, I have to say that I enjoy, for lack of a better term “deeper” video games and the story behind them. So far these games only include Passage and Space Refugees, since as I stated before, my gaming experience is limited. I like these games because unlike melting my brain in front of a game of digital football, these games make me think and have more meaning to them. They spark conversation as to what they really mean and the story of them.
I already wrote a blog entry about Passage (if you haven’t read it then same on you) so I think I’m going to concentrate more on Space Refugees. But, just to some up my last Passage entry: simply design, deep game, lots of meaning, a.k.a. I liked it. Ok, now on to Space Refugees.  read more »