I don't think I've ever deployed the terminology here, but Gabriel and I will sometimes use the term "videogame" to describe a game that feels good to play. It's the result of many games being so bent toward epitomizing their genre conventions that they lose sight of the fact that they are something you have to play with in order to enjoy. There are a lot of Bethesda games that are very "open world," which is not without its virtues, but the actual experience of playing them is worthwhile because of those factors and not because someone thoughtfully modelled the experience of being there. As an example: Battlefield has always offered scale, but their gunplay and movement haven't always risen to the moment; I feel like BF6 is a videogame, even if my own sloth and ineptitude sometimes obscures it. At least they know what's going on.
I also think ARC Raiders is a fuckin' videogame. I got approved for access through Steam for their "Server Slam," a big test nine days out from launch, and with about 190k players just on Steam it looks like they might be onto something.
I consider Extraction something like a frontier genre, where MOBAs or Roguelites were years ago. It's situated closer to MOBAs because it requires that you contend with other players and it has very stark dynamics where you bet the hours of your real life for rewards wicked men may steal. This genre is inimical to a Father's Role, which gives engaging with it the illicit thrill often associated with the streets. Only now that my larvae are in their nineteenth and sixteenth molts respectively can I even remotely consider it.
It has amazing art and cool levels and a few means of softening that grim curve, but it also has a gameplay feel that I just… believe. The vaulting, the movement, the shooting, the performance… they're expertly executed in a way that gives me the confidence to even address this genre. I'm itching for it, after the 'Slam. God help me, I think I'm gonna bite.
(CW)TB out.
