Games

I really don't understand your position, and I'm not fully sure you understood mine, I'm not trying to pick a fight or be abrasive here, I'm honestly interested in what you have to say, even if we do ultimately disagree, I'm just not fully sure I do understand what you're saying.

I understand you have a lot of positive memories with these games, I do to, I'm not some "tourist" or whatever, like I said, I've played SC2 since it came out, I know about the grind, I know about losing and using it to improve my skills, the problem is, at some point it stops feeling like I'm actively improving and learning, and more like I'm memorising, it makes the game feel like work. The satisfaction at improving a skill is gone and it just becomes drudgery.

And I only put up with it for so long because of the more accessible stuff that made the game fun in the first place. A game without that, that is only focused on the competitive side has no appeal, which I thought we agreed on, but we apparently don't seem to? I thought we both agree that the focus on the competitive e-sport aspect is what made Stormgate dull and not fun to play.

I'm not saying I want every game to be super easy and everyone wins all the time, I'm saying I want strategy to be the core part of a strategy game, the main thing that lets people win, not memorising and practicing build orders or improving APM, not focusing on optimisation, but focusing on creative thinking and self-expression, which personally, is what makes a hobby appealing to me. You mention fighting games, isn't it more fun to win a match when you can predict and counter what your opponent is doing, rather than just winning because you had faster reflexes?

I'm not trying to put words in your mouth or accuse you of anything, sorry if it comes across that way, I'm honestly trying to understand your position here, I'm not upset or mad or anything, I'm more confused. So sorry if I seem to be attacking a point you aren't actually trying to make, you obviously have a lot to say on the topic and it seems quite close to you, so I'd rather understand you, even if we just end up disagreeing, there's nothing wrong with that, but I can still learn some interesting insights from you.

To reiterate my own position to avoid confusion about it: I don't like when strategy games focus more on the "hardcore" or "professional" side of things and demand hundreds of hours of work from potential players before they can even win a match, I think it is bad for the games and actively hurts any potential community that can form around them, any new strategy game that comes out is going to need to focus on the players actually wanting to play the game and enjoy their time, not focus on pushing players to "invest" hundreds of hours into the game.

When I mention fun matches with friends, many of those friends were friends I made after we had a particularly intense SC2 match together, usually though one of us winning due to a risky and unusual but clever strategy, but if a strategy game just involves being "better" rather than out-thinking an opponent, I don't think you can have that same sort of respect for your opponent develop. When a game's skill is entirely built around how many hours a person has put into the game, all I can think when someone beats me is "I guess they spent more time in the SC2 mines than I did." It isn't fun and it doesn't feel worthwhile to me.

I think that strategy should be more important than just winning through practiced skills alone, not that I think every game should be "casual" or "fortnight" or whatever, just that the skills people practice in a strategy game should be ones focused around being more strategic and tactical in their thinking, rather than the skills they need to focus on being about improving twitch reflexes and memorisation of the "optimal" strategies. I'm not saying those things are bad, I think they work great in a fighting game context, I just don't think they should be the main focus of a strategy game. I hope I've made my position a bit more clear.