Genre Suggestions

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Richard Bos
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Re: Genre Suggestions

#16 Post by Richard Bos » Wed Oct 15, 2014 4:10 pm

Gunness wrote:"Egyptian" doesn't suggest the ancient setting, and "archaeology" would be a unnecessarily generic name - I can't recall any games that would fit this genre outside of the ones with the pyramidal setting, anyway
Oh, and by the way... yes, you probably can. Ruins, the instructional game from Graham Nelson's Inform Designer's Manual. If you haven't read it, and are interested in writing (aot playing) IF, do read the DM4. Even if you're not using Inform, the design sections are invaluable.

I note that this isn't on the site! I'll send the data fortwith.
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Re: Genre Suggestions

#17 Post by Alex » Wed Oct 15, 2014 7:52 pm

Gunness wrote:and "archaeology" would be a unnecessarily generic name - I can't recall any games that would fit this genre outside of the ones with the pyramidal setting, anyway
Well there are more games within the archaeological genre then the ones with the pyramidal setting. There are games concerning the Incas, Mayan, Aztec, Greek, Roman and crusaders to give some examples.

Gunness wrote:While we're at it... we have an (unreleased) platform. Would it make sense to have a (lost game) genre to specify games that - at least currently - seem to not exist any more? Outside of the early mainframe games, there are quite a few Spectrum and C64 games (and others), that have been reviewed years ago so we know they exist - but if a game hasn't shown up in emulated form yet, there's a good chance it never will. Furthermore, it would be a good tool for those keen on tracking down lost games. And if they should turn up, well, the tag would be removed again.
Seems a very good idea to me.

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Re: Genre Suggestions

#18 Post by Alastair » Wed Oct 15, 2014 11:56 pm

Here's another vote for a (lost game) genre.

Also, we have Medieval and Prehistoric genres, shouldn't there be one in between?

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Re: Genre Suggestions

#19 Post by Gunness » Thu Oct 16, 2014 8:29 am

Ok, I've added a (lost game) genre - so feel free to update where appropriate!
Alex wrote:
Gunness wrote:and "archaeology" would be a unnecessarily generic name - I can't recall any games that would fit this genre outside of the ones with the pyramidal setting, anyway
Well there are more games within the archaeological genre then the ones with the pyramidal setting. There are games concerning the Incas, Mayan, Aztec, Greek, Roman and crusaders to give some examples...
You might be right. Though I think a lot of the, say, Roman and Greek games are set in that time period (some time around or before Christ) rather than now, so that wouldn't make them archaeological? That's the problem of having 6,000 games in the database - I used to have an overview of what was in here, but not any longer :)
Alastair wrote:Also, we have Medieval and Prehistoric genres, shouldn't there be one in between?
Probably - but what would it be? Neither genre is tied down by geographical constraints, so they can cover a wide range. Any genre in between those two would have to be very specific, a la Alex' Incas, Romans, Vikings and Greeks. Which could lead to an awful lot of subgroups. Maybe somebody has a better idea than me?

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Re: Genre Suggestions

#20 Post by Gunness » Thu Oct 16, 2014 8:57 am

One more question re. the lost games - my initial idea was only to use it for games that we positively know to have existed (due to reviews or otherwise). But we have quite a few titles in our database that can only be labelled as dubious - ie. games that we only know of via advertising or otherwise. Potential vaporware, if you will. The "lost game" could be extended to cover those titles as well. It would give us a chance to weed out among such titles, but on the other hand, since many of them probably never made it beyond a line in an ad, they could hardly be classified as lost.

What do you think?

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Re: Genre Suggestions

#21 Post by Richard Bos » Thu Oct 16, 2014 11:06 am

Gunness wrote:
Alastair wrote:Also, we have Medieval and Prehistoric genres, shouldn't there be one in between?
Probably - but what would it be? Neither genre is tied down by geographical constraints, so they can cover a wide range. Any genre in between those two would have to be very specific, a la Alex' Incas, Romans, Vikings and Greeks. Which could lead to an awful lot of subgroups. Maybe somebody has a better idea than me?
"Ancient" or "Classical" maybe? Both are mainly associated with the Mediterranean area, but still, they'd apply to the Celtic world just as well. Maybe not to the East and to Central America, but then, our time zones don't really apply to them in the first place.

As for Vikings, they are mediaeval: their first real pillage raids were during the post-Charlemagne era, and they settled down some time after William the Bastard. In the coastal regions of continental Europe, the Middle Ages always bring to mind the image of barely domesticated, brutal Scandinavian and Danish barbarians - sorry, Jacob!
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Re: Genre Suggestions

#22 Post by Richard Bos » Thu Oct 16, 2014 11:08 am

Gunness wrote:One more question re. the lost games - my initial idea was only to use it for games that we positively know to have existed (due to reviews or otherwise). But we have quite a few titles in our database that can only be labelled as dubious - ie. games that we only know of via advertising or otherwise. Potential vaporware, if you will. The "lost game" could be extended to cover those titles as well. It would give us a chance to weed out among such titles, but on the other hand, since many of them probably never made it beyond a line in an ad, they could hardly be classified as lost.

What do you think?
Speaking as a database browser, I'd like all now-lost games to get a label, whether they are known to have existed or not. But it doesn't have to be the same label for both cases.
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Re: Genre Suggestions

#23 Post by Alex » Thu Oct 16, 2014 11:27 am

Gunness wrote:Though I think a lot of the, say, Roman and Greek games are set in that time period (some time around or before Christ) rather than now, so that wouldn't make them archaeological?
I agree games set in another time period are not archaeological. For a game to be in the archaeological genre I think it would have to take place in a recent time setting (for instance 1900 or later) but concern an old culture like the ones I mentioned above (at least that is the humble opinion of this real archaeologist :) ). Most of these games are treasure hunts or concerning some type of curse by entering some ruins. There are several games like that.


I think just sticking with the genre lost for games not available, whether really lost or not known if they are actually created, is fine to prevent making things to complicated.

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Re: Genre Suggestions

#24 Post by Alex » Thu Oct 16, 2014 11:55 am

Alex wrote:I think just sticking with the genre lost for games not available, whether really lost or not known if they are actually created, is fine to prevent making things to complicated.
On the other hand maybe it is an idea to change it to another genre when it is 100% certain a game never has been created like Sword of the Samurai.

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Re: Genre Suggestions

#25 Post by Richard Bos » Thu Oct 16, 2014 9:44 pm

Alex wrote:
Alex wrote:I think just sticking with the genre lost for games not available, whether really lost or not known if they are actually created, is fine to prevent making things to complicated.
On the other hand maybe it is an idea to change it to another genre when it is 100% certain a game never has been created like Sword of the Samurai.
Hmmm... we do have "(unreleased)" for that, but for some reason that's a platform, not a genre.
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Re: Genre Suggestions

#26 Post by Richard Bos » Thu Oct 16, 2014 10:01 pm

Richard Bos wrote:
Alex wrote:On the other hand maybe it is an idea to change it to another genre when it is 100% certain a game never has been created like Sword of the Samurai.
Hmmm... we do have "(unreleased)" for that, but for some reason that's a platform, not a genre.
And having looked into this a little more, we currently actually have three categories which could apply: (unreleased), which counts as a platform; (unpublished), which is, weirdly enough, a company; and (lost game), which is a genre. All we need now is (unwritten) for an author, and we can go fish.

Logically, this should even be a whole new category, "Publishing status", which would include at least "available", "never published", "lost", and for a few lucky games, "recovered". And there are probably a few more options. But that would be rather more work, and our esteemed founder and webmaster is already busy enough.
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Re: Genre Suggestions

#27 Post by Gunness » Fri Oct 17, 2014 8:22 am

Yes, this has been a royal mess. The (unpublished) company was intended to show that a game such as X-Men was in fact a w.i.p. by Adv. Intl. So if you clicked on AI, the game would turn up in the listing, but clearly be displayed as non-existant.

An entirely new category, Publishing status, is a neat idea but not going to happen (any time soon, at least)

Anyway, too many categories. Fortunately, Hannes has made an excellent batch update tool, so I've already made the following changes.
- We now only have two relevant genres, (lost game) and (unreleased game)
- (lost game) covers all games that might actually be lost. That is, games that are known to have existed as well as games that we're uncertain of (the "vaporware" ones). Until proven otherwise, they are all lost.
- (unreleased game) covers all games that we know were never completed. Ideally this list should never grow very long. It's basically for the more notable titles which are by prolific authors or part of an existing series.

I haven't updated the (unreleased) list yet, but quite a lot of them need to be moved to the (lost) list, as we don't know if they were written or not.
How does that sound?

Oh.... regarding Sword of the Samurai. Is it 100% certain it wasn't released? The entry doesn't say so.

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Re: Genre Suggestions

#28 Post by Gunness » Fri Oct 17, 2014 1:07 pm

Looking back at those pyramids once more.... would "archaeology" be a good compromise? I could live with it :)

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Re: Genre Suggestions

#29 Post by Alex » Fri Oct 17, 2014 6:31 pm

Gunness wrote:- We now only have two relevant genres, (lost game) and (unreleased game)
That's certainly much clearer. Unfinished games like Pokol Angyala II are also considered unreleased I suppose?
Gunness wrote:I haven't updated the (unreleased) list yet, but quite a lot of them need to be moved to the (lost) list, as we don't know if they were written or not. How does that sound?
Sounds good. I also noted at least one error for a c64 game in the list, because unpublished has been used for a game which has been written, but which was initially not published until it emerged somewhere in the public domain sector. I'll check it.

Gunness wrote:Oh.... regarding Sword of the Samurai. Is it 100% certain it wasn't released? The entry doesn't say so.
Yes, that's 100% certain. Apart from Sword of the Samurai they were also thinking about turning "appointment with F.E.A.R." and "Demons of the deep" into an adventure game, but none of them were realised.

Gunness wrote:looking back at those pyramids once more.... would "archaeology" be a good compromise? I could live with it
I think it's better, because it could be used for more games.

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Re: Genre Suggestions

#30 Post by Alastair » Fri Oct 17, 2014 10:59 pm

Gunness wrote:Looking back at those pyramids once more.... would "archaeology" be a good compromise? I could live with it :)
I suppose "Tomb Raider" is out of the question?

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