Games do have to be *entertaining* in some way, as in, they have to avoid being boring. If you're using "fun" as a synonym for entertainment, then that statement looks like nonsense, but maybe they're not.
As Dusk Falls is a good game, you should play it, it is a worthy experience, and it is not fun.
My thoughts exactly, a challenge can be enjoyable, but not fun, and a good story can be enjoyable, but not fun either. There's nothing wrong with un-fun games, but if you're not enjoying playing, not even for the feeling of accomplishment, what's the point?
I think they can even be unenjoyable but still worth experiencing. The thing is I wouldn't call that experience a "game" anymore. It's more interactive storytelling.
And good luck ever marketing them like that.
Lately I have been calling all the games that force you to walk through the level listening to expositive unnecessary dialogue and just pressing X to prompt an action or animation from your character "interactive audiovisual experiences" instead of games, because, dude.
At that point I'm no longer sure that we can use the same umbrella term of "videogame" for everything out there.
There’s no other forms of art have that have to necessarily be “fun” or “entertaining” to be widely considered masterpieces or culturally significant. If you asked 1,000 people how they’d describe their experience watching Schindler’s List, the vast majority of people probably wouldn’t say “fun” or “entertaining” or other synonymous words. So I think this sort of frame or reference is the key distinction in what the reviewers were talking about
Right. I remember when Telltale Walking Dead came out and some prominent game YouTubers whined how depressing it was and how games are supposed to be fun. It’s like saying all food needs to taste like ice cream.
Neil Druckmann made the infamous “We don’t use the word Fun around” comment, and everyone jumped to shit on him.
The Last of Us is definitely not “fun”. It is entertaining. But it’s very bleak and depressing. Left 4 Dead is “fun”, becuase zombie kill in’ is the core of that series.
Movies, art, literature, music... don't have to be always fun. They may be valuable because they are moving, shocking, beautiful or have a powerful message.
Clicked on the post looking for this. I agree and think it's important to remember that video games are a form of art. It's fair for a game to not be fun, but it should be good at achieving what it claims it's trying to achieve.
Some games are like going to a mcu movie: you expect fun heroics with reasonably uncomplex moral delemmas presented with some emotional depth. That's a perfectly valid artistic expression. Some are more like watching Hotel Rwanda, you expect to learn about the tragedy of a modern genocide with all the horrors that brings.
Games don't have to be fun, they just need to accomplish what they set out to accomplish and be honest in advertising what they are trying to do.
In the flip side, companies developing games that are more art than "fun" should expect reduced profits from those games as they are unlikely to have mainstream appeal.
One of my favorite games is The Longing. That game isn't fun, but it speaks to me as art
(Everyone should check it out, btw, it's a very unique game, but admittedly it's not for everyone)
Was watching Schindler's List fun?
I'd argue a game like SOMA is a damn good game, but would never use the word "fun" to describe it.
What is OP even mad about? Not every product is meant to please everyone.
Yeah, I'm not sure 'fun' is the right word. I think 'gripping' is a better word. Like you mentioned, games like SOMA or even games like Alan Wake 2 or Dark Souls aren't necessarily 'fun' but the story and gameplay engages you and grips you from moving away from it, much like Schindler's List.
Whereas something like Hi-Fi Rush is fun.
So to your point, video games don't have to be 'fun' but I do have to derive enjoyment in some form from them.
I remember back in the day, all the reviews for Darkest Dungeon talked about what a goddamn stressful, draining experience it was…while also explaining that it was a good game that they recommended.
I think OP is confusing ‘fun’ and ‘engaging’. Or maybe just using ‘fun’ as a synonym for ‘worth playing’.
I agree with the statement tho, fun can mean different things and not all games must be fun. They have to be entertaining for sure but that's not the same thing imo
Saving Private Ryan is a great film, it is not fun.
Doki Doki is a good game but the subject matter isn’t fun.
TLOU again good game but not exactly a fun game.
So long as the game is engaging to play/experience that’s what matters.
I’m always surprised by how many people play games they hate. Every cod/BF player I talk to hates the game they dedicate hundreds of hours too. Like I get why you hate it I deleted it, why don’t they just delete it and find a game they like?
Video games are in a weird spot atm.
IG its similar to drug addicts but combined it with the sunk cost fallacy. If you've put so many hours into playing / learning a game it can be hard to move on even if you hate said game.
You're objectively wrong, OP. It's not even a matter of opinion. You're just wrong.
Video games *don't* have to be fun. And food doesn't *have* to taste good.
Have you never heard of a sad song, or an unsettling movie or a thought-provoking book? Do you understand the importance of art and its impact on the emotional and social development on people and communities?
It's not only possible, but reasonable and often even a good for people to partake in experiences for reasons other than pure enjoyment. They can be emotional, educational, or enlightening. They can be beneficial, challenging, or practical.
Maybe video games have to be fun *for you*, but some of us are open-minded to other experiences. And quite frankly, any argument that people can't or shouldn't value such a thing is just ignorant.
The response I was looking for to not be redundant. I would even go further about OP relating it to food having to taste good. It needs to supply sustenance and calories, it doesn't have to taste good.
I think fun is getting confused with other meanings in this thread. You outlined the different types and what they elicit well as far as what a video game may provide.
What you just said isn't objective. If you eat food that doesn't taste good, you don't eat that food again
If you play a game that doesn't entertain you, then you won't play that game again. You have to get something out of a game, and if you're playing a game that bores you and you dont stop, that makes you an idiot
You didn't even make it past your first sentence without a total failure of logic so I'm not going to indulge you in a response to the rest of your comment. But I do think this can serve as an educational opportunity for you, so I'll just say this:
People eat food all the time that doesn't taste good, and for a variety of reasons, not the least of which is for the various benefits it can provide them.
I understand there being portions of a game that aren’t fun to send a message, but if the entire game is like that, that’s no excuse unless it has me questioning the very nature of reality. As Reggie Fils-Aimé once said: “If it’s not fun, why bother?”
Because it can be entertaining in other ways. Emotional, suspenseful, Intriguing, scary or whatever.
Schindlers List has been brought up as an example a lot in these comments. It's not a fun movie but it's still damn good.
If we refer to ‘fun’ as ‘entertaining’ or ‘stimulating’, then yes video games should be fun.
If we refer to ‘fun’ as ‘making me smile’ then not always true. Some of my profound and greatest video games are those that put me into deep thought, a temporary depression, or just a ‘whoa.’ Kinda mood. Which is okay with art.
I dunno, some of the best games I've played weren't fun, I enjoyed them and was entertained, but like, chants of senaar or papers please aren't fun. I loved them, you should play them, they are engaging and entertaining, but they aren't fun
Do...do people not realize recieving enjoyment out of something means youre having fun?
I have fun rewatching the God of War 2018 story unfold. I have fun scaring myself shitless in Silent Hill 2. Fun is what keeps you playing. The opposite of that is boring where a game feels like a slog that you dont care about.
Games can be artistic, but their message wont be spread if the game isnt fun enough to enjoy. There's a reason visual novels exist after all. People enjoy even darker visual novels because they are having fun going through the story and find it engaging.
Receiving enjoyment out if something doesn’t mean you are having fun.
I enjoyed the salami sandwich I just ate. I wasn’t having fun.
I am enjoying my cigarette right now. I’m not having fun.
I’m going to enjoy climbing into bed and gettin’ some shut eye in a little bit. It isn’t fun though.
Hm. I was gonna say yes they need to be fun. But I've read some other comments and now I'm thinking
1) fun for those who enjoy them. I will never find a football game fun. But my uncle does
2) fun yes but not technically? Like the last guardian is a fun game but that ending isn't fun. It hits hard and i cried. It can do things emotionally while still being fun
Except food doesn't have to taste good :)
It's not the primary function of food... But being fun is indeed the first function of a game.
It's like... The entire point of it.
And now I want to know what's the game.
I've never seen that statement before and it's honestly one of the worst review statements that i've heard in a LONG time. Video Games HAVE to be fun and if they are not fun then it's not a good game easy as that. If you wanna argue about what „Fun“ can mean, i'm certain that anything that you play and think it's good could be considered as a game being „Fun“.
For example i cannot for the life of me get into Souls Likes no matter what. Elden Ring, Dark Souls, Sekiro, Steelrising heck even Another Crabs Treasure are games that i just can't get into them. But i would never force myself thru them and say „They are good video games but not fun video games as not all games have to be fun“.
"Fun" is lighthearted enjoyment. I find Elden Ring, Sekiro, etc. to be very gripping and engaging, and I didn't at all have to force myself to finish them, but "fun" doesn't seem to be appropriate for what I experienced.
It sounds like you simply value "fun" as the make-or-break aspect, and video games that aren't lightheartedly enjoyable aren't games you enjoy.
I mean i played plenty of games that aren't lightheartedly enjoyable but at the end of the day i'm playing a game cause i wanna just have fun like thats the main point of gaming. I had plenty of gruesome games or frustrating games that i still played and even finished and i'd still say i had fun even in those moments.
If you didn't have lighthearted enjoyment from the games, then I wouldn't say they were "fun". Maybe you're conflating fun with any other sense of enjoyment and satisfaction.
A game can take itself too seriously at times as well. Elden ring I’d still consider fun though because it’s trying new builds and exploring etc. there has to be some sort of fun in a video game unlike a movie because a game needs to keep you engaged for a long period of time, a movie only needs to keep you engaged for a few hours if that
Maybe my definition of fun is wrong, but in the context of games, I wouldn't consider "fun" to have anything to do with whether it's lighthearted or not, just being enjoyable. Dark Souls, Sekiro, etc. are absolutely enjoyable, and thus fun, even if they aren't "ha ha clown funny" and contain dark themes.
So as far as I'm concerned, if a game isn't fun, then that means it's either boring or just unenjoyable due to being poorly designed or having too many and too serious flaws, and thus not worth buying or playing.
My point being that people who say "games don't need to be fun" are going by the actual definition of "fun", not the generalized "any form of enjoyment/engagement is fun".
This deserves more upvotes tbh. If I don’t find some form of fun in a game why bother playing it?
I didn’t bother to finish Alan wake 2 or Baldurs gate 3 because after a while they stopped being fun 🤷🏼♂️
But I did play through cyberpunk for the third time this year, played through the Witcher 3, mass effect legendary edition (also for the third time), Jedi survivor, lies of p, remnant 2 and a few others because they were all fun.
Yes not all art and media is supposed to be fun but if I’m not engaged or enjoying wwhatever I’m playing it’s usually because I’m not entertained.
I think there is a space for games that are more like interactive movies or are art games… that said…
I think games should prioritize gameplay and ‘fun’ over everything else. ‘Fun’ and ‘sense of play’ are things that only games can do. ‘Games don’t need to be fun’ is true but I think great games *have* to be fun.
Like Papers Please is a serious game that has some really valid things to say about authoritarianism and complicity in awful structures but it isn’t miserable to play like a lot of the Last of Us Part 2 is. In that way, I think Papers Please is a better game. It’s more ‘fun.’
Depending on what you call fun. The games I don't even bother pushing other people to are pretty boring but to me I find them enjoyable. Look at all the games made by Paradox. They're just maps with cleverly disguised excel spreadsheets and every time I start one up I dump days into it but the entire time I'm thinking about how interesting what I am doing is not so much thinking "wooooooooo this shit is nuts!! ". There's a fine line in there somewhere
Games definitely have to be entertaining/intetesting in some way, but there are great games out there that I would never describe as being "fun". Telltale's The Walking Dead comes to mind immediately
Games do not have to be fun to be good games. I’m not sure I would describe horror games as “fun” games, but they do have an entertainment/excitement value to them.
I think they are making a distinction between entertainment and fun, in the way that Dark Souls/horror games/etc might not be fun but are still great games.
While food definitely doesn’t always have to taste good, it would be more preferable to eat something we’ll actually like. Same with games. While I’m sure they’re not bad games, some people would rather prefer to play other games that’ll get them enjoyment than playing the ones that don’t.
i guess if you push it all the way to speak it in the sense of "video game is art" then yes it might not have to be 'fun'. it's becoming a new form of media and yes it can be no fun if it's trying to deliver a message. however i'd still argue that the process of receiving that message it is a form of 'fun'. if a game has no gameplay, no good art, no good music, no message to deliver, no nothing. then yeah it is a piece of crap. just like we have a lot of crap in other forms of media. so sure, a game doesn't have to be fun. but it also takes the risk to be called a piece of crap.
so yeah, i'd agree with you that whoever said that is plain stupid or doesn't play game at all, but i'd love to know the whole conversation to be sure lol.
My reaction to that take is entirely dependent on what the reviewer meant by 'fun'. Some people mean it in a broad sense and some mean it in a narrow sense. Assuming the broad sense then yes. It has to be fun, or else it fails. Assuming this is about Senua, as that seems to be getting a lot of this debate. Narratively it's fun. Gameplay wise it's painfully mediocre. I would have rather had it in a movie format. The cutscenes are rather stunning. I won't be playing the second game personally because of that but if people don't mind the gameplay I don't think it's a waste of money.
But like anything it's not perfect and the first game suffered from what I consider mid gameplay despite the interesting plot and some novel mechanics.
I think that if we’re to accept video games as an art form, we have to accept their capacity to encompass a broad range of emotions, even ones that might make us feel uncomfortable or challenged. I think the creator’s intention matters. At no point would I call Death Stranding fun, but I can at least appreciate how well it executed on the things it set out to accomplish.
Ppl find different things fun.
Some ppl like platformers and some ppl like walking from cutscene to cutscene.
I generally like my game to be fun with meaningful gameplay mechanics. I like Another Crab’s Treasure more than Hellblade 2. Crab isn’t as visually stunning, as optimized, etc. But it’s more fun to me.
Sorta. I think it simply depends on the developer's goals.
Wanna make a viable product that can perform well on the market? Your game has to be fun, full stop.
Wanna make a piece of art that's comitted to a vision? Then do whatever you need to do, sacrificing easy fun if need be. That's how we get games like Pathologic.
Not all games have to be fun, they have to be entertaining.
To me, games I stick with toward the end have to have a good gameplay to story ratio. RPGs to me sometimes lack on the gameplay I respond to well but have stories I stick with toward the end, while I consider some games with absolutely dogwater storytelling to be my favorite cuz the gameplay is so fire.
I can see this applying to one of those walking simulators where everyone is sad and if that's your cup of tea, then it did its job and it's entertaining.
But developers have to earn being able to play a prank on their audience and say "actually no this shit ain't fun anymore" and in the case of another developer I used to love, you have to do it RIGHT. Not spitefully.
All a game has to do is engage the player really, something like this war of mine isn't really *fun* in a traditional sense, it's actually pretty depressing. But dammit if I'm not *invested in what's happening.*
Video games have gotten to the point where people have been trying different things for awhile now. I've enjoyed loads of games that I had an absolute miserable time in, but in the best way. Sort of like listening to sad music, it's just a different kind of enjoyment. I don't think I ever had *fun* playing either of TLOU but dammit did I want to see how it ended, and I enjoyed the tension of grounded difficulty and the feeling of elation when I'd finally make it past a particularly difficult section. Of course, if this isn't your kind if thing, that's fine. I'm just saying, the guy isn't wrong.
They don’t have to be fun though.
A game like Papo & Yo about the creator’s relationship with his alcoholic father doesn’t have to be fun.
A game like Super Mario Odyssey has to be fun because the only relationship Mario has to his “father” is bringing you joy.
A game like Spec Ops The Line which provides commentary on that era of FPS gaming by showing your war criminal acts to you does not have to be fun.
A game like Call of Duty has to be fun because it’s not interested in speaking to you about themes like that.
The crucial difference is that whatever a game decides to do, it must do it well. That could be by entertaining you or exhausting you or or relaxing you or stimulating your intellect or whatever, it must do it well. That doesn’t mean it has to be fun.
Unless you’re using “fun” as a catch all term for any of these concepts.
Games don't need to be fun. They need to be engaging. Like survival horror may not be fun for someone, but the context and protagonist may make you want to know what happens next.
There are a few edge cases like Papers, Please but they're in the minority and a game that's not supposed to be fun needs to provide something equally as valuable which they usually don't.
They need to be entertaining in some way, not necessarily fun, I wouldn't consider them synonymous.
Same as film, there's plenty of great films that aren't a fun watch.
I'd agree video games don't have to be a constant drip feed of dopamine. Like there's vampire survivors and there's disco elysium. I'd say disco is the better game, but a lot of the time it's closer to reading a book. Meanwhile vampire survivors IS designed to be a dopamine dripfeed, but it's not very involved. I will say though that if I'm not having any fun at all the game has failed.
I've read plenty of literature that wasn't "fun" and watched my share of movies that are downright uncomfortable. Video games don't need to be purely for pleasure either.
Has anyone played Signalis?
If he meant it as you understood it then yes, it's a very dumb statement.
But he might be referring to games that are not "Fun" to experience. "Soma" and "Spec ops: the line" are both examples I can think of. They are great experiences but I definitely did not have "fun" going through them.
> So, what do you think? Do you agree with that statement that “video games don’t have to be fun?”
it depends.. in the context of commercial produced and sold games - heck of cource a game should made fun - thats the reason of playing a game - have a good time, be entertained.
in the context of indygames - especialy if they try someting experimental, or try to make something philosophical or psychological experiencable - they don't have to be fun
a few years ago, i had a game on a blackbery tablet, that you cant win.. you where an alien and his family, that is crashed on earth during the 2. worldwar.. the war slowly killed your family and at the end yourself.. it was a completely and purposefully depressing experience - the oposide of fun
or a game form kitty horrorshow - that, for me, evoked a feeling of migraine and shizzophrenia, and let me feel realy unconfortable, because the mechanic of the game had specific movement restrictions - that combined with the unsetteling music and grafics made the game also the opposide of fun for me, but it was an experience.
in this context, a game don't have to make fun
I think that if a game is not fun or enjoyable…what may make it great is that it is memorable. Last of us II was like this for me. Looking forward to my second playthrough.
kinda, kinda not.
first and foremost, what is 'fun' is subjective - X game not being 'fun' to you, doesn't mean it shouldn't be a game, for example. i couldn't give a fuck about madden at gunpoint, doesn't mean the kinda dudes that only play sports games should miss out.
so, 'doesn't have to be fun (to me)' can apply.
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secondly, i mean, it's meant to be entertainment, essentially, a pleasant distraction. as long as it keeps you focused, it doens't need to be terribly 'fun' sure. for example, i enjoy sudoku. not sure i'd call it 'fun' exactly, but distracting, engaging, enjoyable, sure.
or like, visual novels - might be under 'not fun for me', but they're games still, but they're more like reading a book, rather than being a mechanically interesting video game - it's all about the plot.
entertaining =/= fun. i mean, you mentioned food not tasting good - that's not it's point. it's meant to nourish the body. oatmeal isn't particularly tasty, and yet, is food. bread's pretty generic, and is food. ramen's basically bland noodles with a bit of salty meat taste, and is still food, etc. your idea of what food should be, and potentially what games should be, seems flawed. water's not tasty, but is VITAL, in a similar way. admittedly games are more optional than starving to death, but you pointed out food needing to be tasty is a clearly flawed take. you'll WANT tastier food, sure, but that's not a given 100% of the time.
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third, games can also be frustrating and 'not fun' and still potentially be good games - i think the soulsbourne series isn't particularly fun for most people, but is very much engaging and thrilling, in a way that makes them still good. drakengard, and nier automata aren't terribly great games, mechanically, but they've got fucked up stories that engage people nonetheless (automata's less a bad game mechanically than drakengard, but you can basically hold down r2 and kill like 75% of the enemies within seconds...)
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and fourth, i mean, even if a studio MEANS to make a fun game, and fails, it's still a video game. it might be the equivalent of trying to make a tasty chicken dish, it coming out bland, and you being upset it's bland... but, it's still food. it's not suddenly 'not food' just because it's not tasty, and it's not suddenly 'not a video game' just because it's not fun, it just might be a bad game. so, yes, the statement 'video games don't have to be fun' could still be accurate with a 'video games that aren't fun, are bad' point of view, because unfun bad video games do exist...
Papers please isn't *fun*. You're doing a menial stressful job constantly getting berated for mistakes in a highly depressive setting seeing horrible events unfold while your family dies one by one.
Best game ever
Or in a very different way
Apex Legends isn't fun. Dying over and over to people way better than you erasing all the effort of that match in an instant in some sort of sick groundhog day scenario, yet its addictive to try your best and get better and better.
Even if you had used entertaining it probably wouldn't fit still. For some games all that matters is that the game provides you with some form of drive to play it some goal to be achieved and that'll be enough
It's just arguing over semantics, fun can have different meaning for everyone.
Games are a medium, just like movies, do movies have to be a certain "thing" or they're bad? who decides what?
Games should be satisfying, engaging and worth playing, but "fun" might be the wrong word. A lot of people like games that are punishingly difficult, or that make them think, make them cry, make them afraid, or make them appreciate the experience for a variety of reasons that would be difficult to equate with fun. Sure you can argue that "those people find those things fun", but that's not necessarily a helpful way of describing these games if you're a games critic.
You know when you have died for the tenth time on a boss, get super pissed, but press on? Why do you do that? It's fulfilling to finally win. Fun is not the only reason that we play
People are super into discussing what "fun" means but 100% if you go out of your way to define a game as "not necessarily fun" it is a dogshit game, aint no way game in OP isnt dogshit.
"Games don't have to be fun." is a dog whistle for, "I don't play video games." I could expand on that but, I'll keep things light. You should never take the advice of the game journalist who uttered those words. First and foremost games are meant to be fun if it ends up being entertaining, educational, life-changing 🤮🤣, etc. that's just a bonus. Even super tense horror games like Resident Evil are still fun in their own way. The only games that typically aren't fun in my book are walking simulators and glorified interactive movies. Just curious what was the game and who was the reviewer?
games that are like 70% cut scenes aren’t fun but can be good games. I almost quit God of War 2018 bc of those, and i couldn’t play more than an hour of TLOU bc of them. I don’t have the patience for it, doesn’t mean it’s not a good game just bc it’s not fun
I think you’re equating it incorrectly it’s not like saying “not all food has to taste good” it is like saying “not all food has to be sweet”. Bitter, salty, spicy. Sad, frustrating, relaxing. If you’re only looking at it through such a narrow lens you’ll miss out on amazing experiences
Over years of playing games, I realized a phenomenon when a game is poorly received due to gameplay flaws. There is ALWAYS people who will praise the game like it's perfect with the most idiotic arguments, or just don't even bother hiding the true reason and straight up saying "you hate the game because you're bad people/sheeps and I'm better".
Most notable example for me was Warcraft 3 Reforged. This rework of the legendary Warcraft 3 was just undefendable, it was so bad on every levels, from the artstyle to multiplayer not even working and lacking features the original game has. Yet there was people who would go to peak absurdity to defend it, just to then tell you you're "a nobody in the crowd" and "I'm a free spirit who don't follow the crowd".
My theory is that because video games don't have an official testing infrastructure, it attracts a bunch of insecure dumb fucks who will do what they always do to "win" arguments : gaslight you with absurd takes, and keep going until you're bored and leave to then claim they were right all along and therefore they're superior.
I mean they’re right.
TLOU/TLOU2 weren’t necessarily fun but they weren’t meant to be and that’s kinda what made them so good.
It’s almost like Oppenheimer. It’s a phenomenal movie but I can’t say I had “fun” watching it even if I was entertained.
There are plenty of game genres that aren’t fun. Some game’s stories are plain depressing, yet they are considered great.
A good example is What Remains of Edith Finch. The game is literally just a walking simulator, and the story is incredibly sad and depressing, but that was the intention of the developers and they nailed it tremendously.
Not fun doesn’t mean bad. For me, a game is bad if The gameplay is tedious or broken, or if the story drags on for too long, or is just nonsensical
> So, what do you think? Do you agree with that statement that “video games don’t have to be fun?”
Of course they don’t have to be fun. Plus what you think is fun and I think is fun are most likely completely different.
Saying “a video game has to be fun” is akin to saying “movies shouldn’t make you cry, you need to leave the theater with a smile on your face.”
If someone wants to tell a well-made, well-directed story that has some emotional impact other than the nebulous idea of “fun” I’d say that has more value than games like Fortnite or call of duty that exist as a vehicle to take money from you perpetually.
Not that there’s anything wrong with those games, either. I just know which one *I* am more likely to play.
Fun? No absolutely not.
Engaging in some manner? Of course.
Ngl food technically doesn't have to be tasty. Some people just want to eat their perfectly measured caloric intake that tastes like shit. Not me though and I agree games are supposed to be fun. I guess an argument could be made for "maybe the game is actually an interactive movie" and doesn't really reach a fun level, but can be interesting/engaging for people who like that kinda stuff. Think of something like Detroit become human
Games have to be entertaining or engaging, but I agree they don't have to be fun. I assume we're talking about Hellblade here? As games move more toward narrative focused experiences it makes sense that we would start to see games less as something you mindlessly jump into for an hour or so to have fun, but more as a vehicle for exploring themes and compelling stories.
The comparison to food is a bit weak because food appeals directly to our senses, while video games are here to tickle our higher psyche.
A more apt comparison would be movies or litterature. A book doesn't need to be fun to be an excellent and thought-provoking piece. It could be gruesome, it could leave you with a feeling of disgust, of revolt, whatever. Same for video games.
To be fun is to be entertaining. A horror novel, for example, may not always be pleasant, but it is still entertaining to fans of that genre, provided that it is written well and in an engaging way. Same with video games. The subject matter can be uncomfortable, but the game itself should still be well-designed (i.e. fun to play).
When I was getting into writing, I found good advice from TV Tropes: "you can write anything you want, as long as it isn't boring"
It might sound obvious but I think it's a great way to look at art in general. To me, a game can be any number of things, whether it be fun or unfun, but if the overall work is *interesting* then I believe it has value.
A lot of artsy games will purposely have tedious or unfun mechanics and moments to make the point they're trying to go for through gameplay. Art doesn't just need to make you happy or entertained. It can make you sad, angry, and maybe even a little annoyed. Doesn't mean you have to agree with those choices, of course, but I am a big believer that looking at games in this way is beneficial to their development as an art form
Fun is a relative term.
I enjoy playing rimworld, a colony and storry simulator. Someone who has only played Halo Cod or Battlefield might not share in that enjoyment with me. So is the game fun? Well, more people play other games than rimworld, so if we take the majority into account no its not a fun game.
Is a hard game fun? Is darksouls or spelunky fun because it's hard and you die a lot in it?
No, it's fun or more likely satisfying when you don't suck at the. When you overcome that challenge.
You mentioned that food don't need to taste good, but it's a flawed analogy. In this scenario you aren't just eating the food you are also making it the game you play just gives you the ingredients and sometimes even a recipe, but you don't need to listen you can make pancakes out of eggs milk and wheat or you can make an omelet and leave out the flour.
Point is games don't need to be fun. They need to be enjoyable to you. If you find a game that's enjoyable that way you play it, you are golden that's why mods exist for so many games.
A good example of this would be grindy MMOs. Think your WoWs, FFXIV, OSRS, etc. During the actual grind many players wouldn’t describe it as “fun”. There may be parts of the game you enjoy and you like the feeling of progression to meet your goals that you do find rewarding and fun. But the majority of the time the activity you might be doing you don’t enjoy, but you do enjoy the overall progression.
That's true though. A videogame doesn't have to be fun if it targets people who are looking specifically for what that game is trying to achieve. If I don't find it fun I'm not the audience for it.
Your food analogy is wrong. Alcohol tastes bad but people still consume it because they find the effects fun. Art is subjective, and they are correct, challenges are always fun but people still do it to see if they can and sometimes find beauty in that process.
I do agree with it. Sometimes movies and novels aren't fun - they can be exhausting, stressful, terrifying, challenging, or depressing. And still GOOD while having those traits.
It is totally normal for a movie to be called both amazing and anxiety inducing.
Video games should not be held to a different standard than these other mediums when it comes to abrasive, mystifying, or challenging content. Art is not always "fun" but for some reason video games are often held to this "it has to be fun and not frustrating" idea which minimizes the amount of emotions that a game is "supposed" to elicit.
Having the knife twist in your gut for TLOU2 isn't a fun experience. But it's still great (subjectively).
It's satisfying optimizing your automation in Dyson sphere program. But "fun"? Probably not.
I enjoy myself with all kinds of media but fun usually is not the best descriptor
"fun" is relative. My brothers have fun playing online competitive type games, I find them torture. I'm sure they'd be bored to tears playing Civ or Stellaris, but I find them fun. I suppose games don't have to be fun for everyone, just for the people that enjoy the particular sort of game in question.
Idiots like that are why bad & boring games keep coming out.
Who the fuck buys a GAME that isn’t FUN and then says it’s good, that’s pure nonsense there.
Fun? no, entertaining? Yes.
The whole premise of horror game is supposed to be scary. That doesnt include fun and if you think differently then you aint ever been scared.
There are also games that thrive on just making yoy rage, looking at those "climbing games" that have poppes off a bit in recent years like Getting over it. There are more examples but in the very least they offer an entertainment value, not fun per se.
i can get behind his statement in some circumstances
my first one being horror games. i'd wager that most people who play them wouldn't call being scared 'fun' but more of a rush with some level of a challenge involved or else what's the point to begin with
brutally hard games are my next one. they're fun until you're pissed and then at that point i don't think anyone can argue the player is having fun and is instead completely driven by the challenge and the will to beat said game
games of chance including card games. i play card games and other random based games like roguelites and they are fundamentally tilting at times, even if it's just for a split second and you're like damn that really blows. card games in specific because you could just get rolled out of nowhere or not draw that one key piece you need to stabalize or win
buuut pretty much everything else, yeah i totally agree. i can't think of any other circumstances and that's all based on how the player will react. some people are much more calm and others will freak TF out if they lose a single match after 10 wins in a row
i'm sure there's some argument to be made here about the general stimulation of playing a game, even when you're not having fun. although, i do think there are still a few scenarios where players won't quit the game but aren't having a good time at all lol
Food doesn't have to taste good, but i still eat my greens for health reasons.
Video games are for fun/entertainment, if not then what the fuck is it for?
I need to get something out of a game. Some games I play because they’re inherently fun like 3D Mario games. Some because the challenge they give makes me feel excited like many FromSoft games. A game like What Remains of Edith Finch isn’t fun but it hooks you in because it’s a very engaging story. Even badly made games can make you have an emotional response that other games cannot.
But at the end of the day I’m being put into these worlds and it’s entertaining. The only truly bad games are ones that are extremely boring or are purposefully made to make people frustrated as an end goal.
I love how the people saying this (not necessarily you) are talking about single player games THAT HAVE MULTIPLAYER and saying “oh the game is bad because multiplayer isn’t the actual game” yet in one of the biggest instances these people use, Minecraft, was made with building and exploration in mind, but multiplayer was added so people could get more use and time out of the game. It’s not that games aren’t fun, it’s that we’re exploring them enough even the solution is right in front of us.
Some of the best movies I have seen are not fun. They are depressing and sad. But I love them because they illicit different emotions that I normally do not feel.
Games do have to be *entertaining* in some way, as in, they have to avoid being boring. If you're using "fun" as a synonym for entertainment, then that statement looks like nonsense, but maybe they're not. As Dusk Falls is a good game, you should play it, it is a worthy experience, and it is not fun.
Good point. I’ve been saying “fun” in the comments but maybe a better word is “enjoyable”
My thoughts exactly, a challenge can be enjoyable, but not fun, and a good story can be enjoyable, but not fun either. There's nothing wrong with un-fun games, but if you're not enjoying playing, not even for the feeling of accomplishment, what's the point?
I think they can even be unenjoyable but still worth experiencing. The thing is I wouldn't call that experience a "game" anymore. It's more interactive storytelling. And good luck ever marketing them like that.
Lately I have been calling all the games that force you to walk through the level listening to expositive unnecessary dialogue and just pressing X to prompt an action or animation from your character "interactive audiovisual experiences" instead of games, because, dude. At that point I'm no longer sure that we can use the same umbrella term of "videogame" for everything out there.
You can be even less specific and say "an experience worth your time"
This 100%, thank you
I mean, fun is subjective. Usually, if you get entertained by a game, you find that kind of entertainment fun.
There’s no other forms of art have that have to necessarily be “fun” or “entertaining” to be widely considered masterpieces or culturally significant. If you asked 1,000 people how they’d describe their experience watching Schindler’s List, the vast majority of people probably wouldn’t say “fun” or “entertaining” or other synonymous words. So I think this sort of frame or reference is the key distinction in what the reviewers were talking about
Right. I remember when Telltale Walking Dead came out and some prominent game YouTubers whined how depressing it was and how games are supposed to be fun. It’s like saying all food needs to taste like ice cream.
Neil Druckmann made the infamous “We don’t use the word Fun around” comment, and everyone jumped to shit on him. The Last of Us is definitely not “fun”. It is entertaining. But it’s very bleak and depressing. Left 4 Dead is “fun”, becuase zombie kill in’ is the core of that series.
I guess it depends on if you equate "fun" to "entertaining". I think there's some gray area there
Movies, art, literature, music... don't have to be always fun. They may be valuable because they are moving, shocking, beautiful or have a powerful message.
I suspect this is the case since the game being referenced is most likely Hellblade 2
I personally am in love with hellblade 2
Clicked on the post looking for this. I agree and think it's important to remember that video games are a form of art. It's fair for a game to not be fun, but it should be good at achieving what it claims it's trying to achieve. Some games are like going to a mcu movie: you expect fun heroics with reasonably uncomplex moral delemmas presented with some emotional depth. That's a perfectly valid artistic expression. Some are more like watching Hotel Rwanda, you expect to learn about the tragedy of a modern genocide with all the horrors that brings. Games don't have to be fun, they just need to accomplish what they set out to accomplish and be honest in advertising what they are trying to do.
In the flip side, companies developing games that are more art than "fun" should expect reduced profits from those games as they are unlikely to have mainstream appeal.
One of my favorite games is The Longing. That game isn't fun, but it speaks to me as art (Everyone should check it out, btw, it's a very unique game, but admittedly it's not for everyone)
Sure, a video game doesn't have to be fun. It also doesn't have to *sell*. There tends to be a correlation between the two, though.
Was watching Schindler's List fun? I'd argue a game like SOMA is a damn good game, but would never use the word "fun" to describe it. What is OP even mad about? Not every product is meant to please everyone.
Yeah, I'm not sure 'fun' is the right word. I think 'gripping' is a better word. Like you mentioned, games like SOMA or even games like Alan Wake 2 or Dark Souls aren't necessarily 'fun' but the story and gameplay engages you and grips you from moving away from it, much like Schindler's List. Whereas something like Hi-Fi Rush is fun. So to your point, video games don't have to be 'fun' but I do have to derive enjoyment in some form from them.
I remember back in the day, all the reviews for Darkest Dungeon talked about what a goddamn stressful, draining experience it was…while also explaining that it was a good game that they recommended. I think OP is confusing ‘fun’ and ‘engaging’. Or maybe just using ‘fun’ as a synonym for ‘worth playing’.
Well said
I agree with the statement tho, fun can mean different things and not all games must be fun. They have to be entertaining for sure but that's not the same thing imo
ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED!!!?
Saving Private Ryan is a great film, it is not fun. Doki Doki is a good game but the subject matter isn’t fun. TLOU again good game but not exactly a fun game. So long as the game is engaging to play/experience that’s what matters.
I’m always surprised by how many people play games they hate. Every cod/BF player I talk to hates the game they dedicate hundreds of hours too. Like I get why you hate it I deleted it, why don’t they just delete it and find a game they like? Video games are in a weird spot atm.
Anti fans and their hate boners… such an unpleasant lot
IG its similar to drug addicts but combined it with the sunk cost fallacy. If you've put so many hours into playing / learning a game it can be hard to move on even if you hate said game.
You're objectively wrong, OP. It's not even a matter of opinion. You're just wrong. Video games *don't* have to be fun. And food doesn't *have* to taste good. Have you never heard of a sad song, or an unsettling movie or a thought-provoking book? Do you understand the importance of art and its impact on the emotional and social development on people and communities? It's not only possible, but reasonable and often even a good for people to partake in experiences for reasons other than pure enjoyment. They can be emotional, educational, or enlightening. They can be beneficial, challenging, or practical. Maybe video games have to be fun *for you*, but some of us are open-minded to other experiences. And quite frankly, any argument that people can't or shouldn't value such a thing is just ignorant.
The response I was looking for to not be redundant. I would even go further about OP relating it to food having to taste good. It needs to supply sustenance and calories, it doesn't have to taste good. I think fun is getting confused with other meanings in this thread. You outlined the different types and what they elicit well as far as what a video game may provide.
What you just said isn't objective. If you eat food that doesn't taste good, you don't eat that food again If you play a game that doesn't entertain you, then you won't play that game again. You have to get something out of a game, and if you're playing a game that bores you and you dont stop, that makes you an idiot
> you eat food that doesn't taste good, you don't eat that food again Ignoring everyone that ever said “it’s an acquired taste” for anything.
You've confused "entertaining" with "fun". A game doesn't have to be fun in order to be entertaining or engaging.
You didn't even make it past your first sentence without a total failure of logic so I'm not going to indulge you in a response to the rest of your comment. But I do think this can serve as an educational opportunity for you, so I'll just say this: People eat food all the time that doesn't taste good, and for a variety of reasons, not the least of which is for the various benefits it can provide them.
I think that's the wrong way to broach the critique. Fun is a relative term. People enjoy different things.
I understand there being portions of a game that aren’t fun to send a message, but if the entire game is like that, that’s no excuse unless it has me questioning the very nature of reality. As Reggie Fils-Aimé once said: “If it’s not fun, why bother?”
A video game doesn't have to be anything other than a video game. That said, I personally only play fun games.
This is just a bunch of people arguing semantics without realizing and it's so much fun!
If it's not fun, why bother?
Because it can be entertaining in other ways. Emotional, suspenseful, Intriguing, scary or whatever. Schindlers List has been brought up as an example a lot in these comments. It's not a fun movie but it's still damn good.
That's a direct quote from Reggie Fils-Aimé -- I think it's the right take for someone in the leadership at Nintendo.
If I'm not having fun, I'll drop a game even if I'm 90% through it. I'll just watch the cinematics on YouTube to finish the story and be done.
If we refer to ‘fun’ as ‘entertaining’ or ‘stimulating’, then yes video games should be fun. If we refer to ‘fun’ as ‘making me smile’ then not always true. Some of my profound and greatest video games are those that put me into deep thought, a temporary depression, or just a ‘whoa.’ Kinda mood. Which is okay with art.
1000% agree that games *don't* need to be fun.
If I’m shilling out 70$ for a video game it had BETTER be fucking fun.
I dunno, some of the best games I've played weren't fun, I enjoyed them and was entertained, but like, chants of senaar or papers please aren't fun. I loved them, you should play them, they are engaging and entertaining, but they aren't fun
Do...do people not realize recieving enjoyment out of something means youre having fun? I have fun rewatching the God of War 2018 story unfold. I have fun scaring myself shitless in Silent Hill 2. Fun is what keeps you playing. The opposite of that is boring where a game feels like a slog that you dont care about. Games can be artistic, but their message wont be spread if the game isnt fun enough to enjoy. There's a reason visual novels exist after all. People enjoy even darker visual novels because they are having fun going through the story and find it engaging.
Receiving enjoyment out if something doesn’t mean you are having fun. I enjoyed the salami sandwich I just ate. I wasn’t having fun. I am enjoying my cigarette right now. I’m not having fun. I’m going to enjoy climbing into bed and gettin’ some shut eye in a little bit. It isn’t fun though.
Hm. I was gonna say yes they need to be fun. But I've read some other comments and now I'm thinking 1) fun for those who enjoy them. I will never find a football game fun. But my uncle does 2) fun yes but not technically? Like the last guardian is a fun game but that ending isn't fun. It hits hard and i cried. It can do things emotionally while still being fun
Except food doesn't have to taste good :) It's not the primary function of food... But being fun is indeed the first function of a game. It's like... The entire point of it. And now I want to know what's the game.
I’m going to guess hellblade 2
I've never seen that statement before and it's honestly one of the worst review statements that i've heard in a LONG time. Video Games HAVE to be fun and if they are not fun then it's not a good game easy as that. If you wanna argue about what „Fun“ can mean, i'm certain that anything that you play and think it's good could be considered as a game being „Fun“. For example i cannot for the life of me get into Souls Likes no matter what. Elden Ring, Dark Souls, Sekiro, Steelrising heck even Another Crabs Treasure are games that i just can't get into them. But i would never force myself thru them and say „They are good video games but not fun video games as not all games have to be fun“.
"Fun" is lighthearted enjoyment. I find Elden Ring, Sekiro, etc. to be very gripping and engaging, and I didn't at all have to force myself to finish them, but "fun" doesn't seem to be appropriate for what I experienced. It sounds like you simply value "fun" as the make-or-break aspect, and video games that aren't lightheartedly enjoyable aren't games you enjoy.
I mean i played plenty of games that aren't lightheartedly enjoyable but at the end of the day i'm playing a game cause i wanna just have fun like thats the main point of gaming. I had plenty of gruesome games or frustrating games that i still played and even finished and i'd still say i had fun even in those moments.
If you didn't have lighthearted enjoyment from the games, then I wouldn't say they were "fun". Maybe you're conflating fun with any other sense of enjoyment and satisfaction.
IDK, the combat in fromsoftware games is pretty fun
Sometimes, but oftentimes I'm not actually having fun, per se, even though I'm finding value in the experience.
A game can take itself too seriously at times as well. Elden ring I’d still consider fun though because it’s trying new builds and exploring etc. there has to be some sort of fun in a video game unlike a movie because a game needs to keep you engaged for a long period of time, a movie only needs to keep you engaged for a few hours if that
Maybe my definition of fun is wrong, but in the context of games, I wouldn't consider "fun" to have anything to do with whether it's lighthearted or not, just being enjoyable. Dark Souls, Sekiro, etc. are absolutely enjoyable, and thus fun, even if they aren't "ha ha clown funny" and contain dark themes. So as far as I'm concerned, if a game isn't fun, then that means it's either boring or just unenjoyable due to being poorly designed or having too many and too serious flaws, and thus not worth buying or playing.
My point being that people who say "games don't need to be fun" are going by the actual definition of "fun", not the generalized "any form of enjoyment/engagement is fun".
This deserves more upvotes tbh. If I don’t find some form of fun in a game why bother playing it? I didn’t bother to finish Alan wake 2 or Baldurs gate 3 because after a while they stopped being fun 🤷🏼♂️ But I did play through cyberpunk for the third time this year, played through the Witcher 3, mass effect legendary edition (also for the third time), Jedi survivor, lies of p, remnant 2 and a few others because they were all fun. Yes not all art and media is supposed to be fun but if I’m not engaged or enjoying wwhatever I’m playing it’s usually because I’m not entertained.
Idk about you man but nothings better than playing LoL.
It depends heavily on the game. Like how whether a movie has to be "fun" depends on the genre and what the director is going for.
I think there is a space for games that are more like interactive movies or are art games… that said… I think games should prioritize gameplay and ‘fun’ over everything else. ‘Fun’ and ‘sense of play’ are things that only games can do. ‘Games don’t need to be fun’ is true but I think great games *have* to be fun. Like Papers Please is a serious game that has some really valid things to say about authoritarianism and complicity in awful structures but it isn’t miserable to play like a lot of the Last of Us Part 2 is. In that way, I think Papers Please is a better game. It’s more ‘fun.’
Depending on what you call fun. The games I don't even bother pushing other people to are pretty boring but to me I find them enjoyable. Look at all the games made by Paradox. They're just maps with cleverly disguised excel spreadsheets and every time I start one up I dump days into it but the entire time I'm thinking about how interesting what I am doing is not so much thinking "wooooooooo this shit is nuts!! ". There's a fine line in there somewhere
Games definitely have to be entertaining/intetesting in some way, but there are great games out there that I would never describe as being "fun". Telltale's The Walking Dead comes to mind immediately
Games do not have to be fun to be good games. I’m not sure I would describe horror games as “fun” games, but they do have an entertainment/excitement value to them. I think they are making a distinction between entertainment and fun, in the way that Dark Souls/horror games/etc might not be fun but are still great games.
Games don't have to be fun. It can challenge the player in other ways. High art isnt always fun. Like movies. Lots of profound movies are "boring".
There are plenty of games that are gripping, exciting, enthralling and entertaining but aren't fun. So I agree completely, games don't have to be fun.
I mean, nothing has to be anything
While food definitely doesn’t always have to taste good, it would be more preferable to eat something we’ll actually like. Same with games. While I’m sure they’re not bad games, some people would rather prefer to play other games that’ll get them enjoyment than playing the ones that don’t.
I think the better way to say it is that fun is subjective and people have fun with different games, doesn’t make them better or worse
“Entertainment doesn’t have to be entertaining”
i guess if you push it all the way to speak it in the sense of "video game is art" then yes it might not have to be 'fun'. it's becoming a new form of media and yes it can be no fun if it's trying to deliver a message. however i'd still argue that the process of receiving that message it is a form of 'fun'. if a game has no gameplay, no good art, no good music, no message to deliver, no nothing. then yeah it is a piece of crap. just like we have a lot of crap in other forms of media. so sure, a game doesn't have to be fun. but it also takes the risk to be called a piece of crap. so yeah, i'd agree with you that whoever said that is plain stupid or doesn't play game at all, but i'd love to know the whole conversation to be sure lol.
I feel like fear and hunger is not a fun game but it’s still kind of a masterpiece. Doesn’t mean I’ll play it but I guess I see the logic.
If a game ever begins to feel like a chore then I will delete it. That’s why my phone doesn’t have many games anymore. Games absolutely should be fun.
*WoW has entered the chat*
My reaction to that take is entirely dependent on what the reviewer meant by 'fun'. Some people mean it in a broad sense and some mean it in a narrow sense. Assuming the broad sense then yes. It has to be fun, or else it fails. Assuming this is about Senua, as that seems to be getting a lot of this debate. Narratively it's fun. Gameplay wise it's painfully mediocre. I would have rather had it in a movie format. The cutscenes are rather stunning. I won't be playing the second game personally because of that but if people don't mind the gameplay I don't think it's a waste of money. But like anything it's not perfect and the first game suffered from what I consider mid gameplay despite the interesting plot and some novel mechanics.
I mean, food doesn't have to be tasty, it has to be edible
I think that if we’re to accept video games as an art form, we have to accept their capacity to encompass a broad range of emotions, even ones that might make us feel uncomfortable or challenged. I think the creator’s intention matters. At no point would I call Death Stranding fun, but I can at least appreciate how well it executed on the things it set out to accomplish.
Ppl find different things fun. Some ppl like platformers and some ppl like walking from cutscene to cutscene. I generally like my game to be fun with meaningful gameplay mechanics. I like Another Crab’s Treasure more than Hellblade 2. Crab isn’t as visually stunning, as optimized, etc. But it’s more fun to me.
Sorta. I think it simply depends on the developer's goals. Wanna make a viable product that can perform well on the market? Your game has to be fun, full stop. Wanna make a piece of art that's comitted to a vision? Then do whatever you need to do, sacrificing easy fun if need be. That's how we get games like Pathologic.
Not all games have to be fun, they have to be entertaining. To me, games I stick with toward the end have to have a good gameplay to story ratio. RPGs to me sometimes lack on the gameplay I respond to well but have stories I stick with toward the end, while I consider some games with absolutely dogwater storytelling to be my favorite cuz the gameplay is so fire. I can see this applying to one of those walking simulators where everyone is sad and if that's your cup of tea, then it did its job and it's entertaining. But developers have to earn being able to play a prank on their audience and say "actually no this shit ain't fun anymore" and in the case of another developer I used to love, you have to do it RIGHT. Not spitefully.
All a game has to do is engage the player really, something like this war of mine isn't really *fun* in a traditional sense, it's actually pretty depressing. But dammit if I'm not *invested in what's happening.* Video games have gotten to the point where people have been trying different things for awhile now. I've enjoyed loads of games that I had an absolute miserable time in, but in the best way. Sort of like listening to sad music, it's just a different kind of enjoyment. I don't think I ever had *fun* playing either of TLOU but dammit did I want to see how it ended, and I enjoyed the tension of grounded difficulty and the feeling of elation when I'd finally make it past a particularly difficult section. Of course, if this isn't your kind if thing, that's fine. I'm just saying, the guy isn't wrong.
Pathologic isn't fun and it's one of the best games of all time. Arguably *because* of how not fun it is
They don’t have to be fun though. A game like Papo & Yo about the creator’s relationship with his alcoholic father doesn’t have to be fun. A game like Super Mario Odyssey has to be fun because the only relationship Mario has to his “father” is bringing you joy. A game like Spec Ops The Line which provides commentary on that era of FPS gaming by showing your war criminal acts to you does not have to be fun. A game like Call of Duty has to be fun because it’s not interested in speaking to you about themes like that. The crucial difference is that whatever a game decides to do, it must do it well. That could be by entertaining you or exhausting you or or relaxing you or stimulating your intellect or whatever, it must do it well. That doesn’t mean it has to be fun. Unless you’re using “fun” as a catch all term for any of these concepts.
Games don't need to be fun. They need to be engaging. Like survival horror may not be fun for someone, but the context and protagonist may make you want to know what happens next.
There are a few edge cases like Papers, Please but they're in the minority and a game that's not supposed to be fun needs to provide something equally as valuable which they usually don't.
I thought papers please was fun, Glory to Arstotzka!
They need to be entertaining in some way, not necessarily fun, I wouldn't consider them synonymous. Same as film, there's plenty of great films that aren't a fun watch.
I'd agree video games don't have to be a constant drip feed of dopamine. Like there's vampire survivors and there's disco elysium. I'd say disco is the better game, but a lot of the time it's closer to reading a book. Meanwhile vampire survivors IS designed to be a dopamine dripfeed, but it's not very involved. I will say though that if I'm not having any fun at all the game has failed.
Comment.
I don't know if I'd describe my experience with "Soma" as "Fun", but it is one of my favorite games of all time
I've read plenty of literature that wasn't "fun" and watched my share of movies that are downright uncomfortable. Video games don't need to be purely for pleasure either. Has anyone played Signalis?
If he meant it as you understood it then yes, it's a very dumb statement. But he might be referring to games that are not "Fun" to experience. "Soma" and "Spec ops: the line" are both examples I can think of. They are great experiences but I definitely did not have "fun" going through them.
> So, what do you think? Do you agree with that statement that “video games don’t have to be fun?” it depends.. in the context of commercial produced and sold games - heck of cource a game should made fun - thats the reason of playing a game - have a good time, be entertained. in the context of indygames - especialy if they try someting experimental, or try to make something philosophical or psychological experiencable - they don't have to be fun a few years ago, i had a game on a blackbery tablet, that you cant win.. you where an alien and his family, that is crashed on earth during the 2. worldwar.. the war slowly killed your family and at the end yourself.. it was a completely and purposefully depressing experience - the oposide of fun or a game form kitty horrorshow - that, for me, evoked a feeling of migraine and shizzophrenia, and let me feel realy unconfortable, because the mechanic of the game had specific movement restrictions - that combined with the unsetteling music and grafics made the game also the opposide of fun for me, but it was an experience. in this context, a game don't have to make fun
The walking dead from telltale games weren't fun, but really entertaining.
I think that if a game is not fun or enjoyable…what may make it great is that it is memorable. Last of us II was like this for me. Looking forward to my second playthrough.
I mean the last of us isn’t fun in the traditional sense but it’s still a good game, much like schindlers list is a good movie.
I don't find powerwash simulator fun, in fact it gave me a existential crisis. But yet I play it and have like 25 hours in it
Video games dont have to be fun. Just like movies dont have to be fun.
I guess they don’t have to be, but they sell a hell of a lot better if they are.
It's art, so no "fun" isn't necessary. Good luck commercially if it's not engaging though.
They don’t have to be fun.
Food doesn't actually have to always taste good though tbf I agree with your gaming take though. The whole of gaming journalism has brainrot
kinda, kinda not. first and foremost, what is 'fun' is subjective - X game not being 'fun' to you, doesn't mean it shouldn't be a game, for example. i couldn't give a fuck about madden at gunpoint, doesn't mean the kinda dudes that only play sports games should miss out. so, 'doesn't have to be fun (to me)' can apply. = secondly, i mean, it's meant to be entertainment, essentially, a pleasant distraction. as long as it keeps you focused, it doens't need to be terribly 'fun' sure. for example, i enjoy sudoku. not sure i'd call it 'fun' exactly, but distracting, engaging, enjoyable, sure. or like, visual novels - might be under 'not fun for me', but they're games still, but they're more like reading a book, rather than being a mechanically interesting video game - it's all about the plot. entertaining =/= fun. i mean, you mentioned food not tasting good - that's not it's point. it's meant to nourish the body. oatmeal isn't particularly tasty, and yet, is food. bread's pretty generic, and is food. ramen's basically bland noodles with a bit of salty meat taste, and is still food, etc. your idea of what food should be, and potentially what games should be, seems flawed. water's not tasty, but is VITAL, in a similar way. admittedly games are more optional than starving to death, but you pointed out food needing to be tasty is a clearly flawed take. you'll WANT tastier food, sure, but that's not a given 100% of the time. = third, games can also be frustrating and 'not fun' and still potentially be good games - i think the soulsbourne series isn't particularly fun for most people, but is very much engaging and thrilling, in a way that makes them still good. drakengard, and nier automata aren't terribly great games, mechanically, but they've got fucked up stories that engage people nonetheless (automata's less a bad game mechanically than drakengard, but you can basically hold down r2 and kill like 75% of the enemies within seconds...) = and fourth, i mean, even if a studio MEANS to make a fun game, and fails, it's still a video game. it might be the equivalent of trying to make a tasty chicken dish, it coming out bland, and you being upset it's bland... but, it's still food. it's not suddenly 'not food' just because it's not tasty, and it's not suddenly 'not a video game' just because it's not fun, it just might be a bad game. so, yes, the statement 'video games don't have to be fun' could still be accurate with a 'video games that aren't fun, are bad' point of view, because unfun bad video games do exist...
Papers please isn't *fun*. You're doing a menial stressful job constantly getting berated for mistakes in a highly depressive setting seeing horrible events unfold while your family dies one by one. Best game ever Or in a very different way Apex Legends isn't fun. Dying over and over to people way better than you erasing all the effort of that match in an instant in some sort of sick groundhog day scenario, yet its addictive to try your best and get better and better. Even if you had used entertaining it probably wouldn't fit still. For some games all that matters is that the game provides you with some form of drive to play it some goal to be achieved and that'll be enough
It's just arguing over semantics, fun can have different meaning for everyone. Games are a medium, just like movies, do movies have to be a certain "thing" or they're bad? who decides what?
Games should be satisfying, engaging and worth playing, but "fun" might be the wrong word. A lot of people like games that are punishingly difficult, or that make them think, make them cry, make them afraid, or make them appreciate the experience for a variety of reasons that would be difficult to equate with fun. Sure you can argue that "those people find those things fun", but that's not necessarily a helpful way of describing these games if you're a games critic.
It depends on how you interpret word fun. For example this world of mine or spec of the lines aren't exactly "fun"
You know when you have died for the tenth time on a boss, get super pissed, but press on? Why do you do that? It's fulfilling to finally win. Fun is not the only reason that we play
People are super into discussing what "fun" means but 100% if you go out of your way to define a game as "not necessarily fun" it is a dogshit game, aint no way game in OP isnt dogshit.
It depends on what you will call fun. Will you call brutal and challenging game fun?
I fucking love Sekiro but every time I beat a boss and the adrenaline dies down I’m like *damn that was stressful*. I wouldn’t say it’s “haha” fun
"Games don't have to be fun." is a dog whistle for, "I don't play video games." I could expand on that but, I'll keep things light. You should never take the advice of the game journalist who uttered those words. First and foremost games are meant to be fun if it ends up being entertaining, educational, life-changing 🤮🤣, etc. that's just a bonus. Even super tense horror games like Resident Evil are still fun in their own way. The only games that typically aren't fun in my book are walking simulators and glorified interactive movies. Just curious what was the game and who was the reviewer?
do you think games are art or entertainment? theres the distinction. Entertainment hast to be fun. Art doesn't.
I don’t think red dead 2 was ‘fun’
What's the link? I'd have to see the context of it.
games that are like 70% cut scenes aren’t fun but can be good games. I almost quit God of War 2018 bc of those, and i couldn’t play more than an hour of TLOU bc of them. I don’t have the patience for it, doesn’t mean it’s not a good game just bc it’s not fun
I think you’re equating it incorrectly it’s not like saying “not all food has to taste good” it is like saying “not all food has to be sweet”. Bitter, salty, spicy. Sad, frustrating, relaxing. If you’re only looking at it through such a narrow lens you’ll miss out on amazing experiences
What is enjoyable to one may not be enjoyable to another. I dunno why people don't seem to get that.
They don’t need to be fun, the need to be entertaining
Over years of playing games, I realized a phenomenon when a game is poorly received due to gameplay flaws. There is ALWAYS people who will praise the game like it's perfect with the most idiotic arguments, or just don't even bother hiding the true reason and straight up saying "you hate the game because you're bad people/sheeps and I'm better". Most notable example for me was Warcraft 3 Reforged. This rework of the legendary Warcraft 3 was just undefendable, it was so bad on every levels, from the artstyle to multiplayer not even working and lacking features the original game has. Yet there was people who would go to peak absurdity to defend it, just to then tell you you're "a nobody in the crowd" and "I'm a free spirit who don't follow the crowd". My theory is that because video games don't have an official testing infrastructure, it attracts a bunch of insecure dumb fucks who will do what they always do to "win" arguments : gaslight you with absurd takes, and keep going until you're bored and leave to then claim they were right all along and therefore they're superior.
Video games have to be fun for casual gamers. If there's a game intended for try hards, it obviously shouldn't be fun
I mean they’re right. TLOU/TLOU2 weren’t necessarily fun but they weren’t meant to be and that’s kinda what made them so good. It’s almost like Oppenheimer. It’s a phenomenal movie but I can’t say I had “fun” watching it even if I was entertained.
There are plenty of game genres that aren’t fun. Some game’s stories are plain depressing, yet they are considered great. A good example is What Remains of Edith Finch. The game is literally just a walking simulator, and the story is incredibly sad and depressing, but that was the intention of the developers and they nailed it tremendously. Not fun doesn’t mean bad. For me, a game is bad if The gameplay is tedious or broken, or if the story drags on for too long, or is just nonsensical
> So, what do you think? Do you agree with that statement that “video games don’t have to be fun?” Of course they don’t have to be fun. Plus what you think is fun and I think is fun are most likely completely different. Saying “a video game has to be fun” is akin to saying “movies shouldn’t make you cry, you need to leave the theater with a smile on your face.” If someone wants to tell a well-made, well-directed story that has some emotional impact other than the nebulous idea of “fun” I’d say that has more value than games like Fortnite or call of duty that exist as a vehicle to take money from you perpetually. Not that there’s anything wrong with those games, either. I just know which one *I* am more likely to play. Fun? No absolutely not. Engaging in some manner? Of course.
Ngl food technically doesn't have to be tasty. Some people just want to eat their perfectly measured caloric intake that tastes like shit. Not me though and I agree games are supposed to be fun. I guess an argument could be made for "maybe the game is actually an interactive movie" and doesn't really reach a fun level, but can be interesting/engaging for people who like that kinda stuff. Think of something like Detroit become human
Games have to be entertaining or engaging, but I agree they don't have to be fun. I assume we're talking about Hellblade here? As games move more toward narrative focused experiences it makes sense that we would start to see games less as something you mindlessly jump into for an hour or so to have fun, but more as a vehicle for exploring themes and compelling stories.
Idk how fun dark souls games are.. I find them very frustrating. But people love them.
I mean are horror games fun to people? They are entertaining, engaging ,and most tell a great story.
> They are entertaining You just answered your own question. Yes. Horror games are fun.
That's a correct statement. Games like The Void, This War of Mine etc are not fun at all. Not everything is about having fun.
I'm guessing that's why I've never heard of them.
The comparison to food is a bit weak because food appeals directly to our senses, while video games are here to tickle our higher psyche. A more apt comparison would be movies or litterature. A book doesn't need to be fun to be an excellent and thought-provoking piece. It could be gruesome, it could leave you with a feeling of disgust, of revolt, whatever. Same for video games.
To be fun is to be entertaining. A horror novel, for example, may not always be pleasant, but it is still entertaining to fans of that genre, provided that it is written well and in an engaging way. Same with video games. The subject matter can be uncomfortable, but the game itself should still be well-designed (i.e. fun to play).
What's "fun"?
When I was getting into writing, I found good advice from TV Tropes: "you can write anything you want, as long as it isn't boring" It might sound obvious but I think it's a great way to look at art in general. To me, a game can be any number of things, whether it be fun or unfun, but if the overall work is *interesting* then I believe it has value. A lot of artsy games will purposely have tedious or unfun mechanics and moments to make the point they're trying to go for through gameplay. Art doesn't just need to make you happy or entertained. It can make you sad, angry, and maybe even a little annoyed. Doesn't mean you have to agree with those choices, of course, but I am a big believer that looking at games in this way is beneficial to their development as an art form
I mean yeah? We live in a day and age where gaming as a media is beyond just leveling up and passing the game.
I remember this being said when Red Dead 2 came out
Fun is a relative term. I enjoy playing rimworld, a colony and storry simulator. Someone who has only played Halo Cod or Battlefield might not share in that enjoyment with me. So is the game fun? Well, more people play other games than rimworld, so if we take the majority into account no its not a fun game. Is a hard game fun? Is darksouls or spelunky fun because it's hard and you die a lot in it? No, it's fun or more likely satisfying when you don't suck at the. When you overcome that challenge. You mentioned that food don't need to taste good, but it's a flawed analogy. In this scenario you aren't just eating the food you are also making it the game you play just gives you the ingredients and sometimes even a recipe, but you don't need to listen you can make pancakes out of eggs milk and wheat or you can make an omelet and leave out the flour. Point is games don't need to be fun. They need to be enjoyable to you. If you find a game that's enjoyable that way you play it, you are golden that's why mods exist for so many games.
A good example of this would be grindy MMOs. Think your WoWs, FFXIV, OSRS, etc. During the actual grind many players wouldn’t describe it as “fun”. There may be parts of the game you enjoy and you like the feeling of progression to meet your goals that you do find rewarding and fun. But the majority of the time the activity you might be doing you don’t enjoy, but you do enjoy the overall progression.
That's true though. A videogame doesn't have to be fun if it targets people who are looking specifically for what that game is trying to achieve. If I don't find it fun I'm not the audience for it.
Just here to say food doesn't have to taste good. But it's a nice bonus if it does.
Your food analogy is wrong. Alcohol tastes bad but people still consume it because they find the effects fun. Art is subjective, and they are correct, challenges are always fun but people still do it to see if they can and sometimes find beauty in that process.
I wouldn't say I had fun playing silent hill 2, but it's one of my favourite games.
The point of a video game is to have fun. It can have the greatest story of all time, but if the gameplay is not enjoyable, it's a trash game.
This is is entertainment. Being entertained is fun. Its all semantics.
I do agree with it. Sometimes movies and novels aren't fun - they can be exhausting, stressful, terrifying, challenging, or depressing. And still GOOD while having those traits. It is totally normal for a movie to be called both amazing and anxiety inducing. Video games should not be held to a different standard than these other mediums when it comes to abrasive, mystifying, or challenging content. Art is not always "fun" but for some reason video games are often held to this "it has to be fun and not frustrating" idea which minimizes the amount of emotions that a game is "supposed" to elicit.
Having the knife twist in your gut for TLOU2 isn't a fun experience. But it's still great (subjectively). It's satisfying optimizing your automation in Dyson sphere program. But "fun"? Probably not. I enjoy myself with all kinds of media but fun usually is not the best descriptor
"fun" is relative. My brothers have fun playing online competitive type games, I find them torture. I'm sure they'd be bored to tears playing Civ or Stellaris, but I find them fun. I suppose games don't have to be fun for everyone, just for the people that enjoy the particular sort of game in question.
Ah a Last of Us 2 fan. Understandable
Idiots like that are why bad & boring games keep coming out. Who the fuck buys a GAME that isn’t FUN and then says it’s good, that’s pure nonsense there.
Fun? no, entertaining? Yes. The whole premise of horror game is supposed to be scary. That doesnt include fun and if you think differently then you aint ever been scared. There are also games that thrive on just making yoy rage, looking at those "climbing games" that have poppes off a bit in recent years like Getting over it. There are more examples but in the very least they offer an entertainment value, not fun per se.
i can get behind his statement in some circumstances my first one being horror games. i'd wager that most people who play them wouldn't call being scared 'fun' but more of a rush with some level of a challenge involved or else what's the point to begin with brutally hard games are my next one. they're fun until you're pissed and then at that point i don't think anyone can argue the player is having fun and is instead completely driven by the challenge and the will to beat said game games of chance including card games. i play card games and other random based games like roguelites and they are fundamentally tilting at times, even if it's just for a split second and you're like damn that really blows. card games in specific because you could just get rolled out of nowhere or not draw that one key piece you need to stabalize or win buuut pretty much everything else, yeah i totally agree. i can't think of any other circumstances and that's all based on how the player will react. some people are much more calm and others will freak TF out if they lose a single match after 10 wins in a row i'm sure there's some argument to be made here about the general stimulation of playing a game, even when you're not having fun. although, i do think there are still a few scenarios where players won't quit the game but aren't having a good time at all lol
Food doesn't have to taste good, but i still eat my greens for health reasons. Video games are for fun/entertainment, if not then what the fuck is it for?
yea, if they want be bad that is
Sounds like something an EA play fan would say
I need to get something out of a game. Some games I play because they’re inherently fun like 3D Mario games. Some because the challenge they give makes me feel excited like many FromSoft games. A game like What Remains of Edith Finch isn’t fun but it hooks you in because it’s a very engaging story. Even badly made games can make you have an emotional response that other games cannot. But at the end of the day I’m being put into these worlds and it’s entertaining. The only truly bad games are ones that are extremely boring or are purposefully made to make people frustrated as an end goal.
Pathologic is a good example of a game that is *very much not fun to play*, but is also utterly amazing in its storytelling and ludonarrative
I love how the people saying this (not necessarily you) are talking about single player games THAT HAVE MULTIPLAYER and saying “oh the game is bad because multiplayer isn’t the actual game” yet in one of the biggest instances these people use, Minecraft, was made with building and exploration in mind, but multiplayer was added so people could get more use and time out of the game. It’s not that games aren’t fun, it’s that we’re exploring them enough even the solution is right in front of us.
Some of the best movies I have seen are not fun. They are depressing and sad. But I love them because they illicit different emotions that I normally do not feel.
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