Video Games: Why we play, TryHards & Bill Maher is wrong about us

Let's chat for a moment....

Most of you reading this are just like me, a gamer.  A label embraced by our community but scorned by many in a society that thinks we should be spending all our time worrying about things that we have little to no control over.

That we don't and instead choose other pursuits seems to give license to those so-called "normal" people to dismiss, denigrate and insult what is just another pastime.  Albeit one less traditional than say running around a field chasing a ball ( like a dog ) Or dressing up like a tree and running around a forest shooting at things that don't shoot back.

Yeah OK, we're the immature ones.

Well, to be fair some of us are but then I've met some pretty immature people that never picked up a game controller or spent an all-niter trying to conquer that last level with a few beers and some like-minded friends.  

BTW, their idea of fun usually involves meat sweats and watching someone else chase after a ball on TV...

But I digress.

That we may enjoy things less tangible often speaks to our station in society.   For many of us the only chance at a victory comes from something of little value to the world at large.  

It's not a resignation to defeat or a lack of ambition.  Instead it's a little taste of victory that we may not otherwise have.  

Let's face it.  There is no sure-fire roadmap to success in anything anymore and the increasing popularity of gaming is a direct reflection of that.  You have to win at something once in awhile just to keep your sanity.  

You have to have something in your life that at least has a chance of paying off for your investment. 

Games may be one of the last refuges of that even if the payoff is meaningless to anyone but you.

Take a look around.  You're bound to know at least a few people with a whole lot of debt that ended up with nothing to show for it.  

No wonder then that gaming has become so popular.

As an aside...

No Bill Maher, on this you have no foundation for an opinion and are flat out wrong with the barbs you've leveled at an entire community.  You're way too old and have enjoyed way too much privilege and success to understand why some people turn to things like games and comic books.

That said...

The real world is always hungry for an opportunity to turn a profit.  Especially for those looking for an escape from it.  

That's why vacations to places far from the everyday grind are so expensive.  Escape costs and if there's a buck to be made you can be sure there's someone to squeeze the golden goose till she bleeds.  

Video games are no different and as they've become more complex their allure has only gotten stronger.  Especially to those who can't afford those 2 weeks in the Bahamas every year.  

So you pay for your sanity one way or another.  It's just cheaper to do it with a video game.  Or at least it was.  Where there's a market there's someone willing to milk it.  We see it in things like paid DLC, Loot crates, and shoddy triple-A titles with ridiculous pre-order prices.  But that's another topic.

The real world can intrude in other ways.  

Political and racist statements in online game chats,  social Justice agendas baked into  games where there should be none (Yes I mean Battlefield 5) and pay walls to block players that chose not to pay for the "season pass."

I have to admit that all is not purity and light in our community.  Gaming can bring out the worst in certain  people.  You're largely anonymous in an online game which to some is a license to nurture their inner racist, sociopath or bully.

The latest example of the behavior I've witnessed is a new term that's been popping up in chat windows.  The word is, "TryHard."  It's meant to be derogatory and usually leveled at newer players of a game who may not be as skilled as other players but won't give up.  

You just can't seem to win with some people among whom  are those leveling the barb at you.  On one hand you're told to "get good" but when you try you're a "try hard."

So what do you want?  New players to just stand there and be practice dummies? 

I'm sick of the labels.  Everyone's been a "noob" once.  So what?  Seems there's no shortage of labels to throw around at people that somehow get in the way of those "Veterans" out there.

It's a game kids, a freaking game!  People play it to have fun and hopefully learn how to get along in friendly competition.   Whatever life isn't offering up to you is not going to be fully satisfied by mastering a video game so chill the hell out!

It's like alcohol.  It's only meant for a short-term reprieve not a long-term solution to your problems. 

It's gone too far when you feel the need to attack someone who is just trying to be a better player.  Especially when you attack them for doing the very thing you encouraged them to do with all of the "Get Good" you've leveled.

We're not even talking about the cheats who ruin the experience for everyone due to their overheated sociopathic  tendencies either.  

My position is simple.  The world is crappy enough.  We don't need your ego trip reminding us of it here.  If you want to be lord of the game go rent your own server.  Otherwise, play nice.

To that end I'm leading a small and admittedly inconsequential effort to take back the words TRY HARD.   

We should all be "TryHards" and do the best we can all the time enjoying the reprieve that gaming provides. 

Oh, and leave the ego at the door.

So instead of being an ass why not help someone be better.  Why not TRY HARD to make it a better experience for everyone.  You may even find someone that makes your experience better.

We're all there for the same reason.

Benchmarking a Game Stream

If you're a gamer at some point you're probably going to want to take a stab at streaming.  After all, you've spent a lot of time perfecting your "skills" and the world should know about it.

So you may dabble with plug and play options like Steam's Broadcasting or step up to an application like Xsplit but when you get serious and would rather not pay the exorbitant subscription fees you'll eventually come upon OBS.

That's where the fun starts.  Well, if you have a decent Internet connection that is.  If you've got at least a 10Mbit upstream you can probably get by with OBS's default settings.  If not, well then you'll have to learn the fine art of compromise.

I find myself in just such a predicament with relatively anemic speeds from my Centurylink DSL connection of 40MB down and 2MBits Upstream speeds.

In the context of streaming your game to services like Twitch or YouTube Gaming there are a number of factors to consider.  The first being how much your system is being taxed by the game you play.  

If you're maxing out CPU cycles and your video card is already groaning under the strain then don't even bother trying to stream from the same machine you're playing on.  Both the stream and the gameplay will suffer.

You'll have to either build a separate machine with a capture card set up for the purpose or get an external capture appliance like those offered by ElGato.

These days, however, most people have CPU cores to spare and copious amounts of graphics power.  So let's assume you've got at least 4 cores and an enthusiast grade GPU at your disposal.

So you set up OBS, figure out how to get your game to show up in it and you're off to the races.  That is, once you figure out how to set up your connection to your favorite game streaming site. 

Excited, you start your first streaming session and when you check the results ( on another PC or your phone ) it's a pure horror show.

Frame rates in the low teens, more dropped frames than a picture hanger with greased hands and constant buffering.

Unwatchable, Thumbs down, Internet Stardom denied!

Why?

Because unless you've got Gigabit speeds from your ISP you have to consider a few factors before you premiere your first stream.

Factors like how much CPU your game uses, what encoder you'll use for the stream, the resolution you'll stream at and of course what bitrate you can get away with.

In the videos below you'll see some benchmark testing sessions I streamed to YouTube Gaming with the the racing game, Grid Autosport.  I chose this game because it can be very graphically and CPU intensive and pushes enough data across the Internet connection to provide a good baseline test.

I started with a 720P (1280 x 720) resolution with the game set to Ultra detail because my Internet connection can't adequately support a higher resolution without dropping frames even though the PC can more than handle it.  I played around with different settings in OBS until I found a nice compromise between picture quality and performance 

One thing to note, No matter what the resolution your most critical factor is bit rate.  If your bit rate is set too high for the Internet connection you'll get a lot of dropped frames.  Too low and your stream will be like looking through a dirty window.

Another factor that can have a big influence is the kind of game you play.  If there's a lot of action and movement in your game (such as an FPS)  it will require more bandwidth to stream smoothly to your viewers.  If you're playing a multiplayer game like Battlefield 1 you'll have to balance the upstream bandwidth between your game and your stream.  In my case I have to cut my bandwidth in half with OBS or else I get ridiculously high latency in the game itself.  So high in fact that the game becomes unplayable with rubber-banding and server timeouts.

Unless you've got bandwidth to spare, you're going to have to learn to compromise if you want to have a decent looking stream. It's a process but you'll learn all about the intricacies of resource balancing when all is said and done.

The first video shows a bit rate too high for the Internet connection.

The second a middle ground between speed and visual quality.

The last is the best option with visual quality and performance using the NVENC encoder yielding virtually no frame drops (stuttering video) and a good picture.

Flat out WRONG!

  

I get so tired of veiled apologists for the game industry like the clickbait video above. While I can agree with many of the statements made in it, after watching it I had to say something to correct the blatant ignorance and apologist sentiments it contained.  So fast forward and my comment ended up being a 4 paragraphs long so probably better I put it here...

Game ON!


$60 price tags have not been around for 30 years, at least not on PC. Console was always more expensive. It's only in the last 10 years that publishers got the bright idea to make more money by raising the price of PC versions of game for no reason other than they could. As for development costs, that's a bunch of BS. Newer game engines have made development easier not harder. I guarantee it took a lot more effort to build Battlefield 1942 with a lot more hand coding than it did for Battlefield 5. That's why the release cycle can be so short. No developer/publisher is going to invest in a game engine that RAISES development costs. As for the economy argument. Wages have stagnated over the past 30 years and not kept up with inflation. So saying we should probably be paying more is outright wrong. The only place that extra money is going is the corporate suite bonuses and shareholder dividends NOT the people that do the actual work! For one thing back in the day, so to speak, you could spend $40 on a good PC game and get ALL the content including any DLC for that price. It's just that publishers have figured out that they can make money just like car chop shops. More money in the individual pieces ( DLC, loot boxes) than the whole car ( game) but you still pay full price and get half the content unless you pay more. It's greed not development costs that are driving the industry to ruin. Even with falling stock prices EA and Bethesda make money hand over fist regardless of how bad the games they release are. Shareholders be damned, they don't care about games just money. Pleasing them is a fool's errand but there's lots of fools out there. You can't treat a game company like a car company. One is selling interactive art the other a simple commodity. Games aren't commodities unless you let the shareholders take over. It's all about the quick buck now. Get the $$$ within the first quarter of release and then hope for the gravy of DLC revenue which pretty much dries up after a year so then they basically give it away. It's why they can have 50% off sales within 6 months of release. Happened with BF5 and BF1. A year after release BF1 premium ( everything) was offered for $20! BF4 paid DLC was given away just before the launch of BF1 and access to the former Premium only dev content as well.

No, the industry is failing under its own weight. Pre-orders ( their favorite con) are consistently down and that's an indication of fatigue of gamers both casual and hardcore. The wool is being pulled off people's eyes and that's a good thing. The industry needs a solid blow to the groin to set things right and it's coming.