Why can't gamers define soul?

Why can't gamers define soul?

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Gamers can't even define "QTE". Everyone's got their own personal definition

what a fucking shit stupid pointless fucking thread
i hope you kill yourself

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because it's a meaningless term people like to use to sound smart. it means whatever's convenient at the time so they don't have to come up with any sort of actual descriptors, like "edgy".

but soul is defined
soul is thing i like
soulless is thing i don't like

It's something you intuit, not something you arrive at through some process of cognitive deliberation

Old is soul. Gaymers are soulless because they want the newest graphics.

Why is your post so soulless?

Atheism is soulless.

SouL

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i always thought soul meant that it was authentic

What is authentic?

in this case i think it's pointing to a novel personal experience a game gives you as whole
therefore when a remake of a game comes out and they make some changes to it, it of course will lose its 'soul' because it's looks or mechnices have changed from the original and it is not authentic anymore
moreover a new title that you could claim has soul would be a game that managed to create a unique experience that is well made and not cheaply ripped from sometype of low effort archetype and therefor feels like your getting an authentic experience that you can't find elsewhere
furthermore soul and soulless can be confusing to people because if you were to play modern games that have learned from the games that had soul you may be unable to see the value of the older game and recognize it''s authenticity because you have already taken it's values and novelties for granted

Soul is using creativity to surpass the limits of technology

Cause they don't have any.

my braincells owww

soul means that it touches something deep inside you, something you can't quite put into words

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literally whatever I say it is, metaphorically and figuratively

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Really simple. Soul is an individual's production of something from a point of passion purely - from the ground up. A big reason things don't have soul now is because the base code and engines are borrowed. Quite a few indie games have decent soul, for example. Of course Yea Forums doesn't play or discuss those.

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SOUL cannot be defined, only felt. It is beyond the understanding of man. SOUL is a transcendent feeling, as ethereal and sublime as the love between mother and child.

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Now that's an interesting take on the subject, in a pool of mouth breathing retards.

The definition i had was something like: Soul is the effort invested into creating a product. Aka when devs don't overlook things they easily could, for the sake of making the game more detailed, aimed for those who have the attention span to notice and enjoy the little things. Soul = depth, but depth =\= soul, cuz mindless feature expansion leads to bloatware.

Tldr; Soul = cherry on top of the cake, cherry inside the cake, and a cherry in your arse, while the cake still resembles itself, and doesn't become one gigantic cherry itself.

This thread reminded me that Yea Forums exists. How in the hell did that place become so boring and irrelevant?

god i wish i could draw like that

Name one game with good graphics that has soul

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you grew up

Simply put, soul is a labour of love.

Because not everything needs to be nailed down with words.

Same, staring at that pic in nostalgic spree, realizing that being able to draw something kewl can bring good feewings to folk even many years later.

It seems I will never truly escape Yea Forums.

Take your Yea Forums garbage meme and get out.

Meaning is not in words, it is with people.

I don't agree with this one. It may sound good on paper, but in reality a labor of love from someone insane and with a shit taste - leads to an abomination of art. People need management, resource control and common sense when making something. Spending 10 years to polish a turd won't make it full of soul.

ironically the people on /vg/ feel exactly the same about this dump

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An abomination of art is still art, faggot. You can enjoy it for the abomination it is. Eg- Sonic after it went 3D such as Sonic Adv 2 and Heroes

"people" on /vg/ are a bunch of clowns stuck in an eternal circlejerk, each in their own. It's a degenerate orgy board

"Soul" is a quality in a creative endeavor that is indicative of its creator's passion. A remake or a distant sequel often lacks the soul of its predecessor due to the process of replication being carried out by people who had nothing to do with the original property.

Soul is not an objective quality. It's the way an environment tells a story. It's the way a uniform tells you subtle details of the organization that it represents. It's the extra amount of effort it takes for an artist to make something fresh that can still retain the spirit of the setting.

You want the best example of soul versus soulless I can possibly give? Cazadors in Fallout New Vegas have soul while the Mothman of Fallout 76 has no soul. The former is a reasonable inclusion to a setting where mutant bugs try to murder you. The latter is a pop culture reference that makes the game feel like a fucking theme park.

Now we are going even deeper, with new buzzwords pouring out. Define art

yes

>goalpost moving
You started the whole 'art' thing in this discussion, faggot. You're the one who should define it, not me

You are overlapping two or even three different opinions here, buddy. Passion of the creator, believable setting and originality are entirely different concepts.

Fucking imbecile, there was literally a thread two days ago talking about soul.
kill yourself.

Alrighty: Art = something that either innovates, or improves the existing formula. Replication on the conveyor belt isn't art. Shitting on the canvas isn't art either, been done a million times before.

>Passion of the creator, believable setting and originality are entirely different concepts.
Yet they are not mutually exclusive. They all interact and rely upon eachother to create a total experience. That's the entire point. It's a quality that can not be achieved by a corporation shitting out a cheap cash-in.

Because most people are NPCs born without a soul, duh...look at the anti-tranny faggots on this board honestly wishing death on people, are you telling me they have souls?

Well, it's a discussion on word definition. If a depressed schizo chained in a basement makes a fantastic game - i don't think that passion is a requirement. If the game is full of humor and don't have a believable setting on purpose, this isn't needed either. Originality is closer to the point

Soul = Something made as art rather than as a product

Only books have soul

Any blockbuster from 15+ years ago. They had amazing graphics in their time

>Trying to find meaning in oneself, without the comfort of black and white morality, trying to be good without the reward of the afterlife.
>soulless
come on

Read this:

Second

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More like something that clearly had a lot of thought put into it without cutting corners. Products can be art too. The terms are not mutually exclusive.

Alright, I can agree with that definition of art.
Can we however agree that not all innovations/improvements are good however?
Let's go with the Sonic Heroes example. it's clearly a labor of love, with a lot of attention to character interactions, the ability to play as multiple characters at once, and being able to swap them around for different formations, to overcome different obstacles. The soundtrack is also excellent and the levels are designed to have you make the best of these formations.
With all that in mind, you can say that Heroes is full of soul, and innovated the usual sonic formula. The problem is, it's all misplaced, because it's a SONIC game. The game where you're meant to get from point A to point B as fast as possible now became a tedious trek through needlessly convoluted levels, formations being too specialized, the character interactions not adding anything of substance, and switching formations constantly breaking your game pace.
However, even with all that said, the game is still fun to play for all the things it does get right, and a lot of people remember it fondly as a fun game, just not a fun Sonic game.This is my stance-even if it is a convoluted mess, it is still full of soul, and it is enjoyable

K IN O

Was that the rancho relaxo before the rancho relaxo even existed

>If a depressed schizo chained in a basement makes a fantastic game - i don't think that passion is a requirement
Then I don't think you understand clinical depression. People who are depressed need passion just to live.

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If there was soul, there'd be an afterlife. No soul = soulless.

Soul has an agreed upon general definition.
It being that a game has been made for a greater purpose than making money.
That the project director is personally passionate about his project.
that the majority of people working on the project are doing so because they want to work on it rather than want to earn money.
etc.

According to that definition, only innovations (new formulas) and improvements to the existing formula are considered art. Changing the formula entirely, where you had tea, and now it's coffee, means a change, but not an improvement, so doesn't qualify for the "art" status. Now if it can still be considered a product full of soul, despite spitting on their fans, is an entirely different question

Then why does nobody here agree with you, faggot?

2 folks, 1 answer: Sometimes people make great games out of fear of going bankrupt, their last stand in the industry, when they are under heavy stress, forced to sleep in the office, and are constantly thinking about money, waking up in sweat after seeing a dream where they suck off truck drivers for 10 bucks a pop

Picrelated

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>innovations AND improvements
You said here its innovations OR improvements, jackass
And I honestly agree with that more. Not all innovations are improvements, and not all innovations need to be. Innovations can open routes to new things, that can be improved upon and refined which can be considered evolution of art in a grander scale. It is innovation that results in the refinement and production of different genres, so I would consider them art, even if not all of them are good

Then by definition modern games, or retro games can't have soul.

It's not the wording that's the problem, what i mean is that changing the formula doesn't qualify for innovation unless it's something groundbreaking. Taking a car and making a plane out of it is a useless waste of resources, and doesn't fulfill the demands of the fans, who wanted a better car. Not matter how fast it flies and how cool it looks, they still made something nobody asked for, so it's not innovative, neither and improvement, aka not art

I don't know, can you?

Basically the passion a dev puts into his game. You can tell when someone is trully passionate about his project or when they just shit out something as fast as possible to get it out of the way. When you find lots of hidden details, consistent world building, well written characters, hard but rewarding gameplay, you can tell a game has soul.

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>Demanding an explanation instead of seeking the experience

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Zelda BOTW does have a soul?

This actually brings up an interesting question-If it hasnt been done before, how do you know what exactly it is that you want? Adding new things to the formula to shake it up to changing it entirely is all an experimental process with results that are usually a mixture of positive and negative reception, and the subjective nature of what can be considered art begins to muddy the definition.
If we use your example, making a plane out of a car doesnt fulfill the demand of the car fans, yes. In their eyes, it's a failure. However, it does open a new niche for fans of planes, who would consider it art, because as far as they're concerned, it is an improvement of the formula, and/or it is groundbreaking. In that regard, the plane can be considered art in and of itself, even if it doesnt appeal to the original fanbase of cars it was intended for. And as more improvements are made to it, newer, better planes are made resulting in a whole new type of vehicle with it's own fanbase, and their own definition of what's art and soul, etc. This is why I believe any innovation qualifies for art, whether it's good or bad, because it's still an innovation all things considered. And coming up with innnovations requires a degree of creativity and thought, requirements of producing any work of art really.

No real answer to that, since in the current day and age pretty much every existing franchise was bastardized beyond recognition, and zoomers enjoy those new products catering to their tastes. Kinda like modern Fallout games went from 2D tactics into a 3D FPS, there are audiences for both. Is that an improvement, or innovation? Nope, it's a change to a different genre. Personally i don't consider it to be art, it's, well, a change, no more, no less. And only the product quality will form my opinion, without bringing any of the subjective genre preferences into play

the original metro perhaps.

The artstyle possibly, the locations, definitely not the gameplay, not one bit. It's textbook soulless dungeon design and open world gimmicks.

>since in the current day and age pretty much every existing franchise was bastardized beyond recognition, and zoomers enjoy those new products catering to their tastes
I would argue that these are soulless products, since they are obviously playing follow the leader and trying to appeal to as large a fanbase as they can for money
>And only the product quality will form my opinion
That's perfectly fine, user, that's how it should be. We cant all agree on what qualifies as art because it's very nature is subjective. And honestly? I think that's a good thing.

All soulful games are flawed, but not all flawed games are soulful.

Soulful flaws are the result of a creator having ambitions that are beyond their capability. "Perfect" games don't have soul. If you can do something perfectly, then your ambitions are too low. An exaggerated example is an artist that paints a perfectly blank canvas. It is indeed perfect, but soulless.
Passionate and ambitious artists WILL push themselves beyond their abilities, and fail along the ways. The flaws that are the result of those failures are an indicator of SOUL.

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Just you wait for Andy sixx threads on Yea Forums

Why do you keep generalizing?

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From the top of my mind:
Kingdom Come: Deliverance
Pathologic 2
Alien: Isolation

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If this was movies, it would be much easier.
Compare the first Terminator then T2 and the rest of the series, compare The Thing and the prequel, compare LOTR and then The Hobbit.
The worst of all time: SW and then the prequels of SW, let alone the sequels.
See, with movies you don't even have to explain it, it's glaringly obvious.
If they are different games from different genres then they are automatically soulless, as they're not changing with the times, but they're simply using a once good series title to sell their shit they're not confident about.

I learned to draw.
Not THAT well, but basically enough for normies to be impressed. It didn't bring fulfillment, on the contrary, learning art allowed me to better see the flaws in artwork. All I can see in my drawings is flaws. Before I started learning to draw, artwork of my level would probably have looked good to me. Not any more.

It's not fulfillment that drives me to improve now, but fear: fear that I will die before getting gud.

Soul automatically implies no identity politics, because those come from indoctrination, they're not meant in earnest. Name indies that have soul and none of that gay shit.

Art brut is a thing, though.

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Soulless creatures can't define soul.

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Silent Hill 2, 3 and 4

And then that just breaks down into
>thing I like vs thing I don't like

The best way I can justify soul as being a thing is with GTAIV vs GTAV, GTAIV has soul because its such a marked depature from what Rockstar had been doing with the franchise, going from arcadey sandbox to borderline simulationist sandbox it's clear that they committed to it whole heartedly putting in all sorts of details into the game(bowling, familial and GF relationships, cop AI, shooting guns from hands, etc.). GTAV/Online also has soul, but because it felt like Rockstar was trying to go back to being arcadey, but intially its as if their minds were still stuck trying for simulationist and that thought process didn't change properly until GTA:O, where it finally comes into own with putting actual fun activities in and absurd shit like stocking up on candy to quickly replenish health when taking cover, albiet at the cost of grinding/shark cards and not actually being able to steal any worthwhile vehicle.

Having said all that, I personally think soul/soulless is a meaningless word at heart.

Soul is when you have a good feeling in your tummy as you play a game.
Soulless is when you don't.

Unable to articulate what makes something great.

I'll give you a good feeling in your tummy.

Why can't philosophers?

I hope your horse drowns for making this shit thread

And yet, you're here bumping it.

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Second pic has TWO souls though
That's twice as much

It's because everyone is exaggerating definitions. QTE is simple as fuck. They show you exact on-screen instructions what to press, very popular in mid-late 2000s. Prominent example is God of War, God Hand.
Soul is fancy word for sentiment that doesn't look like subjective thing but universal truth. Word for retards enforcing opinions.

I don't see the helm anywhere.

Low poly graphics with a lot of shading.

It was a meaningless term to begin with

>believing that religions are simply black and white code books rather than expansive guidelines that have been debated on as far back as 300 years after the Catholic Church was formed
>believing that you can’t debate on what the bible means how it conveys things and what those mean for our current lives
You didn’t say Christianity, but that’s usually what Atheists go for because it’s the biggest and they wanna seem like their own person by not believing in it.

When it's cute and funny

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a game that doesnt matter how much time has passed you can still come back, play and feel like at home

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Oh come on, a flaw or two is fine, don't get yourself all worked up. Most artists are so shit, it takes like 3 months of study to be better than an average amateur. Obviously if you compare yourself to those with a decade of experience all the time...

I just want more examples of soul vs soulless. Those comparisons are based and redpilled. These threads just bait people into talking about stupid shit and no one is posting soul vs soulless comparisons.

Soul is having sex in a loving relationship, soulless is fucking a whore. Clear enough?

here's the definition

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Based and redpilled

Talos Principle

Isn't SOUL just passion?

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Attention to detail and thoughtful design.

No, because passion isn't soul.