TD
#0
Hi... not sure how to start this off... but I\'m a bit of a southpark fan, and saw an episode making fun of a game called \"guitar hero\"
in the episode the boys get a new video game (guitar hero) and are getting really good at it... one boy\'s dad tries to show them that he can play those songs on a real guitar - to which they all think that\'s lame... later on, the father tries the video game in the middle of the night, and he\'s terrible at it...
later on I was searching for \"dueling banjos\" on youtube to show my friend a sample of good american folk music, and stumbled upon guitar hero dueling banjos... I was a little surprised to see that guitar hero was an actual game - although I shouldn\'t have been too surprised, southpark makes fun of contemporary trends and issues
one comment on the video said \"I love how people who play guitar hero think they can play a real guitar\"
and it just got me thinking about the whole genre of simulated gaming...
dance dance revolution
]guitar hero
that game with the marracas
my initial thought \"hey at least they\'re getting kids away from the standard abstract controller, and moving them toward something closer to real life - and maybe one day they\'ll actually step out of the gaming world and pick up something real\"
but on second thought, in the wake of reading orthodox commentary blasting SecondLife... I think maybe this simulated gaming is worse than previous abstract gaming (like mario, or something)... that this perpetuates a fantasy world and further removes kids from the real world by tricking them into thinking they are doing something creative (like learning a musical instrument) when really it\'s hardly the fact...
anyway, I am curious about other people\'s opinions on this...
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John Chan
#3
what? you mean I don\'t play golf like Tiger Woods?? c\'mon - I hold the spacebar down for EXACTLY the right amount of time EVERY TIME.
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Dia Lamb
#4
Well... you have the point right.
If you are good in guitar hero, you are good in a game.
And if you are good in playing guitar, you are a guitarist! You probably know some music, have trained your ear and dexterity and exercised your brain.
(you also enjoy the concentration required to learn and enjoy the activity, unlike being distracted and bombarded by the games\' musical effects, background words, noise and graphics..)
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EC
#1
I tried guitar hero in the store...I jammed on \"War Pigs\" by Black Sabbath...and did very well...of course it pays to be a musician, but I don\'t know much about the guitar. I do know about the violin and brass instruments and keyboards, since I have played those from time to time... but guitar hero is definitely not the same as actually playing the guitar! That is like saying you know how to play baseball by playing a baseball sim game (I love to do both, BTW). Actually it\'s the other way around.
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TD
#2
hehehe, well I meant when certain games have a controller that resembles the device they are simulating... like guitar hero has a guitar shaped controller.. the maracca game has maraccas that you shake around... dance dance revolution has a pad on the floor to hop around on
I suppose what made the strongest (most hilarious) impression on me was in southpark \"he can play guitar hero accoustically! he doesn\'t need a game system\" and all it sounded like was clicking - and people started clapping and saying \"oh I love this song\" and it didn\'t even sound like music... to me it just said that we get so caught up in our illusions and fantasies that we forget that these endeavors are worthless outside of the imaginary environments created for them
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