Criticism of Wikipedia's 1990s in Video Games Article
As it stands in Jan. 2024, Wikipedia's 1990s in Video Games article does not constitute a passable historical account of 1990s computer games, yet it is ranked highly when searching for keyword string "History of 1990s Computer Games".
The article is spam-city: 6,400 words of hyperlink-stuffed commentary (90% on console games) followed by 6,500 words of hyperlinked references to 150 external sources.
My history of 1990s computer games stands as a far superior overview of 90s computer games and related technologies. Number of sources cited by my article? None. Because I was there, I played the games when they came out. Why would I need to cite anyone but myself?
The Wikipedia article does not separate computer game history from console game history. Instead, it lumps together both computer game history and console game history under "video game history".
But computer games are not video games: they are correctly referred to as computer games, PC games or microcomputer games (e.g., Amiga games). Video games are console games.
In 30 years of playing computer games I have never heard a soul refer to personal computer games as video games. Instead, commentators and gamers differentiate between computer games and video games because they are not equivalent; not by tech nor by genre focus or input devices. [1]
Leading critics and developers of the 80s and 90s wrote "computer and/or video games"; they did not lump the two together.
Consider also the following high-circulation magazines of the 80s and 90s edited by expert journos and champion gamers:
- Computer & Video Games (UK) covered computer games as well as console games.
- Computer Gaming World (USA) did not cover console games [0].
And in the scholarly manuals of 80s and 90s computer games no developers referred to their simulators, strategy games or cRPGs as "video games." If not referring to them by specific genre (e.g, our simulator), they referred to them as computer games or PC games, never video games.
But one need not argue from authority (influential critics and the people that helped build the industry): if the game is coded for a computer and is played on a computer, it is a computer game.
Now, even if some readers disagree with the above -- "Computer games are one form of video games -- I also say VIDYA"), consider the following criticisms of the article:
As of Jan. 2024 the opening paragraph of the Wikipedia article does not even mention computer games, microcomputer games, PC games, Windows games or MS-DOS games, yet it mentions six consoles by name straight out of the blocks.
What a laughing stock!
How can an article omit mention of MS-DOS and Window computer games in the first paragraph of an article on computer and video games of the 1990s? [2]
In addition, as of Jan. 2024 the opening paragraph of the article is hyperlinked-stuffed to the max:
65 "notable video games" are hyperlinked, 51 of which are console games.(78% console games, 22% computer games.)
But my article? 300 words before the first hyperlink. Yet my commentary is sometimes criticized for its hyperlinkage, Wikipedia never. And yet I have not come close to stuffing an opening paragraph with 65 hyperlinks because that would adversely affect reader-experience. Wikipedia does not seem to care, though. And it gets a free pass from the masses that consider Wikipedia to be ever the authority on every subject imaginable.
Maybe the opening paragraph of the Wikipedia article is hyperlinked-stuffed because its "contributors" are trying to spam their fave games to suit their petty agendas, yet the article is not penalized for what comes off as flagrant fanboyism.
Instead, the disservicing article is ranked highly even though 90% of its content is given over to console game history, not computer game history.
Worse than its ham-fisted attempt at homogenization of unrelated subject matter [3], the article insolently devalues the historical significance of computer games by not granting them due coverage.
One could be forgiven for concluding that the article was cobbled together and scibbled out by ignorant North American console gamers that lack computer-game pedigree not to mention awareness of the computer game industries in Europe and Great Britain.
(Even if the article is subsequently edited, its edit history can be reviewed.)
Footnotes:
[0]
Criticism of Computer Gaming World
As a rule Computer Gaming World (1981-2006) did not cover console games. However, it is sad to note that even Computer Gaming World...
... covered a few console-exclusives...
... in their computer-game magazine...
... yet at the same time often looked down their nose at "video games"; by, for example, mocking an A1 arcade-action game for not being a simulator, and ignoring many of the greatest arcade-action games of all-time because they were not 1980s cRPGs with the trashiest gameplay imaginable -- yet those arcade-action games were PC-exclusives with good gameplay.
It just goes to show that no computer-game publication could maintain standards even in their prime.
Computer Gaming World also had problems with computer-game language employment: Two examples of dozens that could be cited:
- They often referred to real-time 3D rendering as screen-scrolling. lmao
- Their 2D and 3D technical language was under-developed, even for the time.
CGW were fixated on wargames, cRPGs and cinematization, but barely any of those computer games exhibited coding prowess, technical mastery or innovations in gameplay; they were mere computerizations of traditional tabletop games. Even some of the fanciest of these computer games played like garbage. The cRPGs were especially bad; many of them only sold well because of painterly boxart that made them stand out on store shelves.
Throughout the late 80s and early 90s CGW's "Hall of Fame" consisted of some of the dullest computer games in the world, which were also poorly-coded and featured some of the worst audio-visuals imaginable, even for the time.
CGW ignored entire genre and barely paid attention to non-Apple and non-IBM micros.
[1]
For example, kb/m or analogue joystick (IBM PC) or digital micro-switched joysticks (microcomputer) are not the same as controller-gamepads. kb/m facilitates complex strategy games, for starters. 1990s consoles did not have such controls as standard.
And as for genre-equivalence as it relates to platform, please show me Falcon 3.0 (1991) running on a Sega Genesis console. And who would call Falcon 3.0 a video game?
[2]
There is not one mention of the Amiga microcomputer in the entire article, yet in the early 90s the Amiga was a king-tier computer game machine in the British Commonwealth and on Continental Europe. Other micros are ignored as well.
[3]
Computer and console games are certainly related in history via cross-platform influence and porting, but computer games and console games were largely opposed in the 1990s: you were not getting Falcon 3.0 on the Genesis in 1991, nor were you getting Sonic the Hedgehog on MS-DOS in 1991.
But the difference is: non-standard VGA coding routines were technically capable of replicating Sonic 1:1, but the Genesis did not have a hope in hell of running Falcon 3.0 at anything above ¼ frame per second. Nor did you have analogue joysticks on the Genesis. Or kb/m as standard.
The only reason Sonic was not ported to IBM PC is because Sega wanted Sonic to be Genesis-exclusive. But the reason Falcon 3.0 was not ported to Genesis is because the Genesis could not handle Falcon 3.0. And it would not have sold well on the Genesis even if it was portable.
Computer-gaming was far more sophisticated than console gaming in the 80s and 90s; completely different worlds; completely different expectations. Which is why computer-gamers complained about computer games getting dumbed down for consoles during The Terrible 2000s.
The overall point is that things are different, not the same. And the other point is that computer games of the 90s are historically significant, not just console games of the 90s.
Then, as often happens in human endeavors, the wild-eyed hack comes along to snatch a piece of the pie. In the name of the quick buck and click the hack cares not for the endeavor, the creative process or genre legacy, but only of shortcuts, leeching and leveling down to the lowest common denominator.
cf. Critical Computer Game Commentary:
Return to: cRPG Blog (Master Index).
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: only a member of this blog may post a comment.