And it reads "Whenever you see someone post a bad take about defining games or gameplay, you enter rant mode for the next 90 minutes."
"Just saw someone say good games can have bad gameplay" yeah and I've seen people say all JRPGs, Visual Novels and Gone Home don't have good game play, so define your terms bucko or stop making ubiquitous-sounding statements that are just cover for the comment "bad games are games I don't like."
This drives me up a wall, because like. What is "bad gameplay?" Is bad gameplay anything that isn't fun, doesn't control well, doesn't feel good? But some of the best most memorable gameplay I've ever encountered is miserable.
In Twilight Princess, which I replayed recently, drawing your sword is clumsy and awkward and slow and you'll probably get hit trying to react to something only for there to be a delay while Link fumbles the sword out. So you get used to it. You may even start pulling the sword out ahead of time when you think there will be danger. And when you do, there is no delay. You were ready. Halfway through the game, when, diegetically, Link is learning how to be a better, more prepared swordsman, you gain access to the drawing slice. It's tricky, but if you master it, you're no longer caught fumbling for a weapon, because Link's always ready, just like the player has learned to always be ready. It's such a small detail, but it accomplishes so much, narratively, emotionally, because of a willingness to feel offputting for half of the game, more if you don't seek out the techniques. Is that bad gameplay?
The original NIER is a game that will sit in my memories for the rest of my life, and, without wanting to spoil it, part of that is because it doesn't feel all that good to play. The combat is not really fun; it can be satisfying, sure, but it always feels like a bit of a slog, like there's a weight you can never quite get rid of in all your movements, like you shouldn't be enjoying yourself. If you've played the game, or its remake, or if you've heard the real life inspiration for it, you probably know why I found this meaningful, why it stuck with me, why I feel like the remake lost something when it gained its polish. Is that bad gameplay?
I could go on and on with countless examples of this. Horror games with stressful controls that you have to fight against, that make you feel anxious and exhausted and unsteady but handling it, because that's what horror has become, is the horror of everything being broken and getting up and moving anyway. Games that rip the control from your hands with the battering of wind while you fight helplessly against it, frustrated and confused and almost wanting to stop... but for the warmth of your friend in the storm, and your refusal to let them continue alone. These are powerful, valuable feelings.
Or just games with really strong, tight gameplay that people fail to understand, and write off, because their previous literacy doesn't immediately transfer without effort. The people who talk about having to grind in RPGs that generously hand out resources if you're willing to meet them halfway. The people who talk about stories being boring while entire thesis statements sail above their head, their lack of willingness to engage leaving them confused and aimless. The people who write off entire genres as having "bad gameplay" when they're just frustrated they're not the ones being pandered to for once.
It's pathetic. The industry has so much potential, so much room left to grow, and yet at every level it's plagued by people who conceive of it as an infant would, with no thought for the value of anything beyond what will personally amuse them. "Good gameplay" is not a uniform thing, that you can define in a dictionary, it is calibrated and tuned with intent to help the greater work accomplish what it needs to accomplish, with tradeoffs and compromises in service of a greater whole, even if "fun" is nowhere within that scope.
