Friday, October 22, 2010

Donkey Kong Questions & Answers

1. Core gammers often look to video game accomplishments to feel successful, important, and sometimes, self-righteous. Core gamers love to compare and compete. These are ideas that have always been at the center of video game values. Core gamers can consider tournaments as serious as world recognized championship sport events. They hold it in high respect. Too some this "culture" is a necessary and very real part of video games.
This is all important to take into consideration when marketing to core gamers. Xbox did a great job, for example, by creating a gamer score that players could compare. Each game you play and the score you have achieved is available for friends and competitors to see, and the player themselves can look at that score when ever they turn on their xbox and feel a sense of confidence, or a need to play more.

2.I think Wiebe is an example of a typical core gamer that sticks with it and will not quit for his own self satisfaction and sense of accomplishment. To him he needed to win to feel confident in his own self-worth.
People with low self esteem can obsess and search for self-worth through high scores. It creates the other side of core gaming competitiveness. 

3. I think it should be valid to send in a tape to show your skill and to challenge a hight score. But in person high scores are the only REAL way to validate a champion. Technology has advanced to a point that tapes cannot be trusted.

4.I thought it was an incredibly entertaining movie. It was a great depiction of the extreme gamer attitudes. I think we have all know a "Wiebe" or a "Mitchell" or played against them at some point in a competitive way. It was fun to experience their journey and the culture behind the vintage game community. Yes I think this was an accurate portrayal of what makes video games playable. A simple and well designed game will be memorable throughout the years and always retain a loyal fan base the way Donkey Kong has.

5.Twin Galaxies is a self established holder of vintage game high scores. They make scores available to the public. They set and establishes rules and decide champions. Walter Day does it for the passion and held championship competitions acknowledged by Guinness world records.

6. I think that Wiebe's ability to compete with a skilled player like Mitchell could definitely be related to the skills he obtained through learning to pitch for baseball and using his hands to play piano or coordination through drums. As you play games or participate in any activity your brain burns pathways of memory into you mind. Some skills you learn can be applied to other areas. Such as timing a jump in DK and timing the tap of a snare drum. Precision can be learned.
I played video games from a very young age and later found a do pick up on tasks involving finger precision quickly like tying knots and braiding to create bracelets(a hobby I was into for a while)

7. Gordon called Mitchell a "puppet master" and this is an accurate statement in my opinion. Mitchell stays on top even when he isn't on top by creating the illusion he is and always will be the best. He didn't acknowledge Wiebe because if he treated him as an insignificant player Wiebe would maybe believe that. You could see in the movie how everyone involved with Twin Galaxies seemed to gravitate to Mitchells simply because he demanded in with his attitude. He was so convinced of his own greatness no one would think to question it.
In broad terms I don't think this behavior is embraced within most gaming communities but within certain subcultures(especially competitive gaming) this behavior is accepted because "they are the best".

8.I think it was an excellent example of the nature. To become so engrossed in a process and culture is so human. To let the fear of losing consume yourself. You could also say it was very political or showed examples of corrupt politics. An example: when the refs declined Wiebe's score on tape but accepted Mitchell's score on tape because he was a long time favorite and had such heavy influence. It was ver interesting to see how in this situation video game obsession can make or break a person. You can see it plainly in the  two polor opposite attitudes shown in this film: Wiebe and Mitchell. These men really believed that it was more than winning a game, that these scores are interrelated to their own self merit.

9. The first time I played this version of DK I was playing Donkey Kong 64 and I unlocked the old version as a mini-game option. I loved it the first time I played and saw it as the hardest mini-game a video game had ever offered me. I did some research and found out it was the 1st DK game ever (I had thought that DK for the Super Nintendo was the first). I loved that Mario was in it but that DK was the main character that drew you in. Often Mario is seen as Nintendo's iconic character and DK is not as recognized as I think it should be. It was fun to learn that they had been introduced together.

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