/lit/ - Literature

>>9154658

why would a 15 year old pick movies or video games when they can post dank memes on facebook and twitter and watch porn?

The general population has never been focused on cutting edge literature. While all the Enlightenment thinkers where devising secular political positions and reinventing mathematics the educated middle class where reading Christian ecumenical works and writing letters to each other.

Literature is by nature esoteric

Convince me not to blow 400 bucks on a PS4 and buy books instead.

>>9154692
Books don't have planned obsolescence.

>>9154688
I'm talking about literature as a whole not the avant-garde. what place does it have in a society that has so many way more attractive technologies and mediums at their disposal to tell stories?

>>9154692
>buying books

>>9154658
Why?

Because they are verbose, poor, sickly, and desperate for escapism.

That's how it worked for me anyway, I wanted vidya but couldn't afford them.

Read about the game play, read about the story, read about the characters, discover entire stories exist with similar themes but no buttons or graphics, these stories are cheap, even free and enlightening.

>>9154692
I won't.

>>9154700
Dubs all around.

Literacy was still a skill possessed by a small group of people. Within that group of people, the majority did what the time period's equivalent of texting and reading accessible works with stories they grew up around. Literature will exist as it always has: mostly shit with a select few pushing the boundaries and a small group of people appreciating the work.

videogames already killed my literary aptitude

>>9154658

Of course it's fun for people on /lit/ to shit on contemporary literature, but literature survived film, television, and comic books cutting in on the market of time people have to do things. Why should video games by any different?

>>9154692
This is in the easy argument to make because I did this very thing today 5 hours ago.

There is a sale on PS4s that ends today. You can get it bundled with Uncharted for $250.

BUT if you buy a $5.00 book instead you can eat a tendies meal every day for a month.....there was never truly a choice.

>>9154658
>will videogames kill literature?
no- videogames have been around for a while now, and they've been really mainstream since about 98. Think about how fast DVD killed VHS. I know it's not the same, but the point is, the nature of our consumption changes- that doesn't imply the death of a medium. Videogames offer something books can't, and books offer something videogames can't.

>>9154741
>books offer something videogames can't.
they really don't

>>9154742
you're reading the wrong kind of books.

>>9154745
you're playing the wrong kind of video games.

>>9154756
Yeah, probably. I just play handheld rpgs. I'm not saying videogames don't have merit, but there's a reason novelizations are a thing.

>>9154692
As a man who played videogames for 15 years almost daily, I regret 99% of time spent on it

>>9154756
this

>>9154770
You should def play Overwatch

>>9154697
That's why he should buy the ps4 while it's still relevant

>>9154772
This picture will never not trigger me

>>9154772
Stop trying to make me angry, it's working

I'm making a big skyrim mod right now, really focusing on the story, characters and themes and using gameplay to tell the story. I think video games is just a different medium it well not replace literature but can take ideas from it and use it with the strengths of the medium. It's exactly what film did with literature and conventional art

>>9154658

Has there ever been a vidya game controller that was not designed for literal children? Just looking at those plastic crampsticks makes my hands sore.

>>9154658
>it's like generation after generation the appeal of literature as a storytelling medium is weakened
It really is "like" the appeal is weakened. In reality the books' audience has been gradually increasing since the invention of writing. Prose writers only really started living off their writing alone in the 19th century. Today the situation is absurd, Harry Potter, ASOIAF, 50 Shades and Twilight are devoured by countless readers across the globe. JK Rowling was the first billionaire writer. Do you know greek and want to make a safe investment? Translate Homer, and your new translations will fly off the shelves. Do you lack literary talent but can churn shit out quickly? Self-publish some erotica. Etc...

>>9155224
How fucking delusional you are, pham? There is like a 100 writers in the world right now who make a living with their writing alone

>>9154772

too bad the gameplay in Spec Ops: The Line was generic shit, nullifying the impact of its entire pretentious "hurr you have to make difficult decisions in war, innocent people die!!" message, which it doesn't even really take that far.

>>9154658

they won't, the two mediums can co-exist, I read and play video games almost equally.

>>9155288
As I recall there were several options in spec ops to stop and desist with the war, but they were axed because it would literally just end the game and fuck everything up, which shows a limitation in the medium itself

>>9154692
You are a lost case and i don't speak to living corpses.

>>9154658

>why would a 15-year-old kid pick a book instead of watching a movie or playing the new Kojima game?

I doubt they will and I wouldn't expect them too because I certainly didn't. But when that kid is 25, maybe he'll realise the novelty of a Kojima game has worn off and get into reading. Therefore Kojima will have served his one and only purpose as an entry-point into fiction.

>>9154692

Because unfortunately the newest generation of consoles sucks. There are fewer mid-tier developers making original titles and fewer chances of the juggernauts opting not to just release a sequels/prequels because they have all the data now and know what sells.

If you want to buy a console, buy a PS3. Boring because it's not new, sure, but the library is much better than anything PS4 will ever achieve.

I regret playing so many video game as a teenager. I read a ton when I was in middle school, it kills me to imagine how well-read I would be now if I had kept reading and not discovered video games and become addicted to them.

Thankfully, I am easing myself back into reading now, and as I have entered my 20s I have drastically cut back on video games. I'm talking going from like five hours a day to jusy a couple hours a week. It's a good improvement I think.

>>9154742

I don't know if you're trying to trigger but one major thing books provide that video-games don't is an external voice. Games are wicked cool but they're inherently narcissist and ego-driven when you think about it. They require you to insert yourself into the text and define everything that happens through your lens. The power of that is individual narratives but the weakness is a lack of a strong critical voice.

>>9155364

Is that because you find books more enjoyable than games?

I personally struggle to play games these days so it's not a choice. Everything feels old and like I've played it in some way before. There's still a great sense of enjoyment that comes from playing something original (whenever one comes out) but absolutely none that comes from playing anything derivative or genre-driven.

>>9154658
>will videogames kill literature?

No, because videos games as a storytelling medium rely on gameplay in order to tell a good story. A good story of itself itself is inherent to literature.

If your definition of a medium 'being alive' is 15 year old using it en masse, then literature was never alive

>>9155364
>having regrets
you're never going to make it

>>9155393

I am finding books to be a lot more rewarding than games.

A video game is great for a quick burst of fun here and there, mostly mindless, but a book is something you can kind of get more out of, if that makes any sense. I mean obviously storytelling with books is better, for one.

>>9155364
Personally I think video games are a great aesthetic(especially colours) introduction. Only if you go actually move on towards better things latter on.

>>9155401
are you sure? what is poetry then? certainly poetry doesn't need a good story.

i could argue instead that good prose and wordplay is inherent to (good) literature. good prose doesn't seem any more "valuable" to me than good gameplay (which essentially means a good user interface for the software).

>>9154723
This is a great post, and an adequate argument against the "literature is dead" faggots who fill this shithole.

what are some red pilled vidya games I can play to still be /lit/?

>>9154692
nigga buy the ps4 and then just get a library card or a used kindle for 20$ to pirate books on. Seriously a no brainer.

>>9154658
There are barely any good games yet. The medium needs more time.

>>9155729
Verse and prose are different mediums within "literature"

Furthermore, I have never, ever been impressed by the writing in any videogame. Even the best in vidya writing, basically the item descriptions in souls games or the isometric rpgs from black isle, are roughly equivalent to non-literary genre fiction. The best ever, the philosophical bits of planescape, are extremely derivative.

>>9155751
I think you are asking for two different things. Being "redpilled" just means youve picked a side in passing culture wars and are susceptible to tribalism.

But if you want videogames that succeed within their medium, tend towards games with less spoken, and more shone. The storytelling should be through gameplay and visuals, not reliant on mediocre writing by a panel overseen by a corporate suit, or worse, an idealistic indie studio owner.

So yes, stuff like Souls Games, adventure games, where the genre itself doesnt limit storytelling to reusing cinematic or literary stylings.

>>9155751
>red-pilled games
Buy For Honour™, the Alt-Right™ certfied Red-Pilled™ vidya. The characters say Deus Vult™, proved to Trigger™ all SJWs™ within ear shot.

but seriously memes aside you can be /lit/ and play vidya. It is harder to be /lit/ and be a reactionary though, so maybe lose the /pol/ memes.

It's really dependent on your approach. Feel like numbing yourself with generic FPS? Go for it, at least you're engaging more than just a background ambient 'kek' born of hours of scrolling social media or 4chan or its ilk

I only play multiplayer games with a group of friends, so even that's mostly devoted to banter and discussing life's goings on with vidja talk intermixed between

Then again, there are some genuinely 'literary' games I've played, or at least, that make you consider something beyond mechanical function, some RTS's (though admittedly most world building would be supplied by 10 year old me practically LARPing), some RPG's of similar approach. i try to think of it as basic mythos which i can utilize to philosophize or challenge. doesn't always work but if it doesn't i'll usually only play for a few hours and do something productive later.

>>9155767
some of the writing in KOTR ii really resounded with me, it was just so properly set in its atmosphere but with odd echoes of intangibles i'd already found issue with justice/thought/action in star wars. that sounds fucking autistic but i do agree with the derivative aspect, though that could apply to any medium.

>>9154658
>will radio kill literature?
>will comics kill literature?
>will cinema kill literature?
>will television kill literature?
>will internet kill literature?

>>9156407
>Will Oculus rift sex peripherals mixed with direct brain interface tools kill literature?
>Will direct cerebral downloads kill literature?

>>9155767
>Furthermore, I have never, ever been impressed by the writing in any videogame.
Besides Planescape, Pathologic is amazingly well-written. Sadly, it's style of prose draws of soviet terminology a lot, and it's basically untranslatable to english.

>>9156420
Eventually we will reach full circle and start writing literature in our new virtual simulation.

>>9156497
>Computer, is literature still relevant?
>"There's is yet insufficient data for a meaningful answer"

> i can't maintain a healthy balance of entertainment and intellectual development.

>>9156471
Planescape writing was trash written by the 90s equivalent of redditors after the ninth reading of hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy

>>9156407
cinema is damn close to literature in terms of quality tho. Video games not so much

>>9154658
No. You're supposed to play video games, not read them.

If Literature as a medium isn't delivering, maybe Literature needs some improvement. So much literature nowadays is upper middle-class, post-college white guy navel-gazing angst. You only need to read this kind of book once, but it's been written over and over again in recent years. Who fucking cares?

>>9154670
Because they are edgy underage shits that browse /lit/?

is FF VII /lit/? Is Underage /lit/? Is Bully /lit/?

>>9154771
this is why I had to quit gaming - i was having panic attacks of realization of my life wasting away

>>9155767
You should play this one. It's really interesting and well-written.

>>9154779
Underrated reply

>>9154658
Videogames will kill pulp
Videogames will kill comicbooks
Videogames will kill blockbuster movies
Videogames are no threat to enduring works like literature

>>9157622

I also unironically enjoyed 80 Days and Device 6. The best video games are the ones with a lot of text.

Roguelikes is the only /lit/ vidya genre, if your games has graphics fuck off to reddit

>>9154658
only if video games really kick up their story-telling ability and pair it with PROPERLY implemented visual segments. as it is, it tends to be games with average storylines and terrible graphics or games with horrible storylines and amazing graphics.
while by no means comparable to the impact that the medium of entire well-crafted books can have on someone, i thought bioshock 1/2(can't remember which) was pretty good, along with fallout 3/NV if you played it in story-driven manner without grinding.
i really think VR will bring the experience to another level. but i can't see how it will be in competition with books it's a different medium.
in regards to how video killed the radio star (visual stimulation destroying our own ability to visualize) and how radio/telephones killed whatever we required before, it's going to keep happening. and i think the solution is to remind ourselves to actively act on reinvigorating our capabilities to use our creative minds.

Killer7 is literature kino video game

>>9154658
>He doesn't play video games AND read literature

Fucking plebs, all of you, I swear.

>>9158285
i remember a guy who probably gamed about a year before and was telling me about gaming is escapist while actively reading (was in a flat with a bunch of humans/arts kids so it was cool) and i was too inept to bring up how books are just as if not more escapist. fuck that pretentious cunt.

>>9158285

I do but as I said in another thread, there are only about three games released each year actually worth playing. Last year it was Inside, Quadrilateral Cowboy and The Last Guardian.

>>9154692
ps4 has no games
its a shitty console that will be quickly obsolete, they already had to upgrade it

get a pc

>>9158667
>STILL mad about bloodborne
NEVER
EVER

>>9154772
I liked spec ops and this still makes me angry

>>9154692

That's several years worth of books.

How long will your vidya machine last?

Honestly it all depends on how much utility you get out of either books or vidya games.

>>9154658
Honestly, I don't think video games are a medium that will stand the test of time.

Will they exist one hundred years from now?

Who knows?

>>9154772
harrison ford was pretty recognizable in apocalypse now i thought

>>9158751
Who'd he play?

>>9158695
Bloodborne's so FUCKING good
I bought a PS4 on ebay just to play it
I do not regret the purchase

>>9154658
most games have the depth and story telling of a michael bay movie lmao

>>9158753
wasn't he like a photojournalist or something? think he got destroyed by some bombs

>>9158753
some cuck with glasses working in a office

I like practically all forms of media

Literature, television, film, music and video games all can tell good stories or be rewarding in one way or another.

I've played games my whole life and only now am starting to slow down my obsession and move it towards literature. But I make time for both.

>>9158751

The unrecognizable one was Laurence Fishburne aka Morphius

>>9154697
>Average Pynchon reader

>>9158744
How will they not? In a hundred years the technology would be mindboggling, I'd wager extreme sports would pale compared to a romp in Call of Duty 500. Content creation might even become standardized and assisted, so a introspective artist type could make a impressive title on his own (discounting the AI development system) without spending his entire life.

>>9159022
Hopefully nuclear apocalypse occurs before then

>>9159092
edgy

>>9159104
Say that to me during the zombie epidemic and then see what happens kid, I wouldn't have these flimsy "laws" holding me back then

>>9154697
hey, i was thinking about planned obsolescence the other day. where'd you hear about it to enter into conversation? i was thinking about it as well as inherent vice, which is funny because the guy that responds to you says you read pynchon, and he wrote a book called inherent vice dontcha know, which apparently is a vague reference to a scene in the recognitions. but i'll stop there, and reiterate, where did the term planned obsolescence come into your more current vocabulary?

>>9159112
*vibrates through the floor behind you*

>>9154772
Lol. I know this is a meme image meant to trigger /lit/. However, if you really learned the lesson "colonialism is bad" from reading Heart of Darkness, that's way more valuable and impactful on your worldview than the stuff listed for Apocalypse Now and Spec Ops. Just sayin.

>>9159397
but "colonialism is bad" is a facile, faulty conclusion

Videogames are a fucking stupid waste of time and they turn your brain into diarrhea.

When are you neckbeards going to get real?

>>9159415
it's a young medium but it has potential. vr will become good and expand beyond games.

>>9155434
It's fine to have regrets, the toxic attitude is that of wishing you could have done something else differently for every mistake, or that you could erase the memory of something embarassing. There is no self improvement without regret, and every mistake we make is just as much an important part of our current selves as every success we make.

>>9159415
t. 4chan poster

>>9159397
Heart of darkness wasn't about colonialism or niggers you fucking faggot, stop spreading your false understanding

First of all the question is spend 400 bucks on a PS4 or spend 100 bucks on a kindle paper white or do anything else.

If you're under 18, buy the ps4. You'll get tired of it. You fucking will

If you're over 18 and having already gotten over video games you're fucked, stop reading this and kill yourself. I'm dead serious. Your life is not good, but getting a better one is as simple as ending this one. When you realize you're having a nightmare you wake yourself up, what I'm telling you know is that you're having a nightmare and that quick shot to the head will. Seriously, just go the gun cabinet and you'll be out. (Me, the author of this post is not complicit in the suicide of anyone that reads this because the post is work of comedic art and therefore covered under the first amendment. Also, I told them to stop reading before I explained why they should kill themselves, but they freely chose to continue reading therefore suicide was an act done under their own volition.)

If you're over 18 and have gotten over video games continue reading.

Now your down to buying a Kindle or doing anything that isn't buying a Kindle.

AvB

If we negate B you will choose A

To negate B flex your free will and go to Amazon this instant and use Mommy's money to send a paper white to the front door. Get it in black with no 3g and pay the 20 dollars to remove ads.

After two days it will get to your house (there's no reason to not get two day shipping. Either your parents have prime or you get free student prime by using your student email (or someone else's student email) to get free prime). During those two days stop masturbating through will power and tell everyone you know that you'll be out of town. After you've posted on your twitter/instagram "Spontaneously going to Paris for 2 months (they'll be very envious when you get back)" or told your friends irl that you're going on a meditation retreat (you can tell if you should cut your friends loose if they don't also have an interest in literature and can't simply be told the truth that you plan on doing nothing but read for the next few months). note: The only people who have more than a couple friends are women and losers. The only people that have a couple friends or less are men and losers. Off yourself if you breach these criteria.

Day before the Kindle arrives download "Calibre"

Once your paperwhite is in a box in the hands of the UPS man who is standing at your front door, ringing the doorbell, get up and walk to your front door. Watch him set the box down and walk away through the peep hole, contemplating his murder. Consider how easily you could get his name/address and then slaughter him in his sleep. When you're done considering that, open the door and grab the box. Then open the whole thing using a steak knife. At some point sit in front of your webcam and repost this with your kindle picture.

Then load your with books from "Bookz" and "LibraryGenesis" while it's online airplane mode.

>>9160080

Any questions you have ask Google, don't talk to anyone, tell your parents you've taken a vow of silence for your mindfulness meditation class (also lie to them and say that you haven't been wasting on the internet, but completing moocs).

If you're a girl and want to know more, email me thenxtjimjones23@gmail.com

Also, stop eating food because it tastes good, eat for sustenance only.

>>9154658
Why would a 15 year old pick up a book when they have a TV?

Why would a 15 year old watch TV when they have a smart phone?

Why would a 15 year old use a smart phone if they have video games?

Why would a 15 year old play video games if they have porn?

Why would a 15 year old watch porn if they have a perfected VR headset and can live in a simulation world (which can include porn and vidya and anything else)?

Why would a 15 year old play with a perfected VR headset when they can read Infinite Jest?

>>9154729
But /lit/ thinks the only good literature is old literature (or at least that's my impression from the outside gazing in)
If you look at the catalog most threads are about classics, very very few are about new books

>>9154692
I won't. Bloodborne is the pinnacle of the medium.

>>9157616
Kentucky Route Zero is /lit/. Grim Fandango might be /lit/. Those three are shit.

>>9160093
I did, but that was in 97

>>9160100

Because very few books are good. Infinite Jest is an example of a good new book.

>>9160100
Literature isn't dependant on technology to stay relevant. Old movies look objectively shitty compared to the new ones, just as older videogames (which is, like, 10 years, kek) look terrible in comparison to the recent releases and soon VR crap.

>>9160238
>Old movies look objectively shitty compared to the new ones

models>cgi

>>9160201
Infinite Jest came out in 1998 you fucking idiot

>>9160273
>>9160201

the publication date for infinite jest was february 1, 1996 you jackasses. all it took to look that up was one google search.

of course, we acknowledge that we are forced to rely on "google" and "wikipedia" to arrive at this knowledge. the techno-industrial complex controls the storage of information, that much is certain

>>9154658
Saying movies are in par with video games?

>>9158781
He was underage, actually.

>>9159415
Check Pathologic out.

>>9159434
It already did, simulators for example.

>>9159397
Apocalypse Now is better than Heart of Darkness

Two words: Talos Principle

>>9160268
the thing looks like shit, but yeah, some of the best looking films (e.g. lawrence of arabia, 2001) are old

>>9154658
If you are not interested in videogames in the 21st century you are a peasant, plain and simple -- just as those who were not interested in, say, the theatre in the 18th or 19th centuries were peasants, and hence utterly incapable of having any meaningful relationship with people of class.

What happens as works become more complex, both in terms of technology and number of artists involved, is that the artwork becomes more of a collective effort. So whereas a painting is the result of the work of its author, as well as the few people who made the brushes, paints, canvas, etc., and the other few who invented the techniques of manufacturing of all these things, a movie is the result of the work of an astonishing number of individuals including a Newton, a Faraday, a Maxwell, an Edison, and so on and so forth — not to speak of a videogame, which includes also a Leibniz, a Boole, a Tesla, a Turing, a von Neumann, and ultimately the entire of line of scientists and inventors leading up to them. The pseudo-intellectuals never manage to get past this laughable conundrum, and by the constant stream of lies, absurdities and stupidities they vomit (all of which of course they take great care, by camouflaging them in obscurantist prose, to pass off to the feebleminded as profundity), they drag the mystified rabble down with them: "photography/cinema/videogames are not art; only primitive artforms are art" .

>>9160661
Decent bait, 6.78/10

Is this a pasta?

>>9154772
So according to this image the videogame is the worst of the three?

>>9160664
How is it bait?

Video games aren't a storytelling medium, though. They are games. All story is just decoration and background. All characters are just game pieces. Games went downhill as soon as the tech got to a point that enabled them to tell grand stories.

>>9155767
>Being "redpilled" just means youve picked a side in passing culture wars and are susceptible to tribalism.
>>9155774
>maybe lose the /pol/ memes.

I remember the days when redpill just meant "truth not many people know" and didn't carry controversial political overtones.

F

>>9154658

No, my theory is a lot of kids are waking up to how corporately castrated the videogame industry and """culture""" has become. This will lead into a newfound interest in other forms of entertainment and escapism, books might even turn into a underground meme for the outcast kids to latch onto.

You look at the state of /v/ and it's obvious just how many people from even just 4-5 years ago have left and just how worse newfags are getting every year, a lot of them don't remember what it was like when it was better or are just in complete denial. There has to be a migration of interests in a lot of people eventually, something has to snap. This also concerns big blockbuster hollywood superhero and sci-fi movies as well as TV series. Any kid with a brain will eventually grow up past a lot of these things, or at least feel a lot of disdain for the current artistic and cultural environment.

>>9158300
He's right though.

Gaming is way more escapist than reading. Good games are games that keeped you hooked by using a specific gameplay formula that appeases your brain's reward system. This is why the most popular games are ones like WoW and Call of Duty. They give you a sense of progression and a reason to keep playing for hours at a time. Sometimes you can weave an interesting story into a game's formula, but the underlying reason most people continuously play them is to quell an addiction.

Reading is nothing like that. You could argue that some people make a kind of game out of reading by ticking off how many books they can read in a year, but the reasons for reading are more complex than vidya.

I would agree they're both "escapist" to an extent, but video games are escapist in the same way heroin and opium is escapist.

>>9160238
Wind Waker and Metroid Prime still look amazing.

>>9160789
Iliad and Republic still read amazingly. How many people are you willing to bet will be playing Wind Waker in the year 4000?

>>9160814
>The Iliad reads amazingly
t.delusional pseud
The Odyssey maybe

Shin Megami Tensei is the pinnacle of video games