15minutes of gaming?

[xclkvnspoijfoisn]

One of the most mind boggling things about this game I find, specifically with the players, is how players enjoy playing the game for 12-15minutes at a time

What I mean by this is that, in my experience playing thousands of games, the vast majority of players when in a game, are looking to kill their opponent and win the game as fast as possible. And this usually occurs between 12-15minutes. If the 15 minute prophecy is not fulfilled then the game may run for 20minutes, give or a take a few minutes.

Why do players find short games fun? I don't get it.

Is it the short lived, but intense spike in dopamine and adrenaline they get when their t1 spam or quick t2 land push finally overwhelms their opponent that decided they want to try eco, therefore sacrificing some unit volume in the process which ultimately leads to their quick demise?

Rushing gun at minute 9 and pushing your unsuspecting and caught off guard enemy by surprise. It's a thrill sure, obliterating your opponent is rapid fashion. Nice one.

But you kill your guy and the game is likely over then. Sure the team can play on but in most cases, this is just a catalyst to the enemy teams quick demise.

You won the game. It only took you 15minutes. Let's go get another game. Let's go wait a bunch more time in the tmm queue, or sit in a lobby for half hour so we can do all that again lol.

My points is that, we enjoy playing this game. So why not intend to play a game that actually lasts a good length of time. You know, play the game. Because you play the game to play the game. You do not play the game to not play the game. That does not make sense. Playing the game is more fun that not playing the game. So why do you rush something you enjoy so quick, to lead to a state that is you not playing the game. Why not intend to do the thing you want to be doing - playing the game - for as long as possible, so that you find yourself in a situation where you are not playing the game. Of course there are diminishing returns in fun when playing the game, and games can and do become boring, that's a matter of subjectivity. Some guys could probably play this game for 10hours and still be having fun. But surely a sane person would agree that doing something you enjoy for longer, is objectively more fun than doing something you enjoy in a shorter space of time.

The arguments that long games are boring or stale or end game meta is all the same also doesn't make sense to me . In the long game when everyone has big bases and big eco, your options are limitless as far as what the game can offer. The same can not be said for the tech 1 state of any game since you are obviously restricted to tech 1.

No matter what map you play or what format, your enemy, no matter his rating or skill or experience, is looking to end you, and thereby end the game as quick as possible. This is my experience.

I understand we are playing a real time strategy game in an online competitive format. I get that. But not every game is a $10,000 tournament final where it is absolutely imperative that you must kill your opponent in the quickest most opportune way you know how or are able.

I know some players will agree with what I am saying, but I know most players will probably disagree. They find the first 15minutes the most exciting. Which I am not arguing with per se. This is the stage that typically decides a game in the majority of games it seems. And the first 15 minutes are for sure fun, raiding opponents, defending raids, pushing for map control etc..

But come on..

Tell me, what is more fun.. a 10k worth of mass t1 land battle, or a 250k worth of mass t1/t2/t3/t4 land battle?

Is rushing navy 10 seconds faster than your opponent and getting 4 additional frigates and 2 subs to crush your opponent, locking him out the navy and effectively beating him really more fun than getting to a stage where you both have a U.S. sized naval armada going to town on eachother. There is so much more fun in the latter, in every possible way.

Or are you blind sided with the raw stimulation you get when quickly dispatching your opponent as quickly and ruthlessly as possible? Way to go.

Of course I have been on the receiving end of such gameplay many times, and being the one myself to fulfill the 15 minute prophecy. It's quite fun winning in 15minutes. It's a thrill to kill your guy quick and win quick. But it can never be more fun than a competitive 1 hour game where the game completely opens up in scale and fun.

I just wish more players preferred the long game, the epic scale the game can offer and the epic battles than can occur.

Remember, this is my opinion. You have yours. I have mine.

The bottom line is this. There is no argument that can convince me that playing this game for 15minutes is more fun than playing this game for 1 hour.

[Kilatamoro]

What maps are you playing? The most popular map (Dual Gap) easily lasts 40 minutes.

[Paradox_of_War]

Second most popular map (Setons Clutch) also lasts 30+ min very frequently, as does most mapgen teamgames. Only gamemode that averages under 15 minutes is 1v1

[IndexLibrorum]

@xclkvnspoijfoisn said in 15minutes of gaming?:

. In the long game when everyone has big bases and big eco, your options are limitless as far as what the game can offer. The same can not be said for the tech 1 state of any game since you are obviously restricted to tech 1.

I'd argue that the late game has just as many if not more limitations as the early game, just in different ways.

Once you're in late stage game, air is mostly locked out of most of the map due to SAMs, most experimentals have to move in clusters to get anything done, none of the T1 or T2 units will see any play, and most of the game just devolves into shield micro and arty wars, plus the occasional satalite and game ender.

That kind of base-to-base war feels very stale to me. I find it much more enjoyable to play with armies pressuring armies, trying to win by manoeuvre and being able to use stuff like drops and snipes.

@xclkvnspoijfoisn said in 15minutes of gaming?:

Rushing gun at minute 9 and pushing your unsuspecting and caught off guard enemy by surprise. It's a thrill sure, obliterating your opponent is rapid fashion. Nice one.

You write this as if the attacking player is in the wrong here. The goal of the game is to kill the enemy commander. If my opponent is dumb enough to overexpose a commander, then he'll get blown up for it. If you're not taking the kills when they are offering to you, you're essentially playing worse just to extend the game. I don't find that any fun nor competitive.

The bottom line is this. There is no argument that can convince me that playing this game for 15minutes is more fun than playing this game for 1 hour.

Right then, shall I lock the thread for you?

[Kampfkeks500]

I remember you insulting my teammate during and after the game with that exact accusation.
Every map has axes of symmetry and should be fairly balanced. If someone chooses T2 Mexes and is later in Navy, that's their own fault and/or lack of scouting. A game where both teams build roughly similar numbers of units rarely ends in a quick rollover.

The idea that you don't want to play the game because you're working towards victory (the end of the game) is funny and echoes The Journey vs. the Destination conflict. Obviously most all players are closer to the Destination side, but on that point I understand the frustration when someone's entire gameplan is to make a Corsair Snipe. Then I also ask myself, “why is this fun for you?” But yes, everyone has their own way of playing the game and as long as it's part of the game, there's no need to ask them unkindly why they're not playing my preferred playstyle.

If you want to change your own experience, there are many maps that have few key points and less reclaim and contestable mexes, I think on these maps you will find your desired playstyle more often as opposed to small mapgens.

[ZLO]

Looks like something directed to players like me.
When i have started playing i was interested in big units, big explosions, big battles.
i theoretically could let my opponent finish their experimental so we would have experimental fight
or we could just mass as many units as we can and then when we are both ready - attack each other so we will have big army fights. We often played with 2x resources and 20 minute no rush

Then very quickly i got into actual multiplayer with not just friends but random people and 1v1 ladder where goal is to win by any means necessary.
And i still was enjoying the game and was trying to improve.
I no longer care if my opponent is not ready when i am attacking, i probably just go ahead and win the game, if i don't, it will be just "playing with the food" and "bad manners"
So naturally i'd just improve my rating and play with players that would not instantly collapse and we would have an actual fight

The amount of time it take for the battle is no longer relevant to me.
The amount of fighting and interaction with my opponent matters
maybe i can still enjoy some spectacle... like when you have dozens of t4 units and nukes and strat bombers and other stuff but it is like 10% of original excitement.
Now i care more about tactic and strategy my opponent has used. If tactic was creative and interesting it might not matter that game is over before 5 minute mark.

You can try to extend the amount of time by playing bigger maps
if i play 40 km map to artificially extend the game time then it will dilute the experience cause i will just interact more with my own base than with my opponent.
And game turns into 99% game of economy and one player just wins cause he has more stuff and i don't really like that

i enjoy maps where i can interact more with my opponent, kinda like map Eye of the storm.
you can attack by land, by air, by navy, by fast comwalk, can do drops, TML (or TML ACU), t2 land push or t2 hover push, torpedo commander, gun commander push and can even to economy (but can't lose to t2 navy). There also are some fun build orders that rely on stealing reclaim from opponent's side of the map. maybe can even bomb opponnet's reclaim with 1rst bomber. even light assault bots are almost viable

Right now I just try to win and then fun just occurs by itself, if my opponent loses or i lose - then fun ends, but i can just start next game instantly (hopefully)

Edit: instead of letting my opponent to build up an army or giving him time to develop I may use more fun tactic that is suboptimal but i will still play for the win after that

[Caliber]

I have to agree players spend 30 plus mins in lobby just to desperatly end the game quickly by shift g units, its pretty sad state of play.

[xclkvnspoijfoisn]

@IndexLibrorum said in 15minutes of gaming?:

@xclkvnspoijfoisn said in 15minutes of gaming?:

. In the long game when everyone has big bases and big eco, your options are limitless as far as what the game can offer. The same can not be said for the tech 1 state of any game since you are obviously restricted to tech 1.

I'd argue that the late game has just as many if not more limitations as the early game, just in different ways.

Once you're in late stage game, air is mostly locked out of most of the map due to SAMs, most experimentals have to move in clusters to get anything done, none of the T1 or T2 units will see any play, and most of the game just devolves into shield micro and arty wars, plus the occasional satalite and game ender.

That kind of base-to-base war feels very stale to me. I find it much more enjoyable to play with armies pressuring armies, trying to win by manoeuvre and being able to use stuff like drops and snipes.

@xclkvnspoijfoisn said in 15minutes of gaming?:

Rushing gun at minute 9 and pushing your unsuspecting and caught off guard enemy by surprise. It's a thrill sure, obliterating your opponent is rapid fashion. Nice one.

You write this as if the attacking player is in the wrong here. The goal of the game is to kill the enemy commander. If my opponent is dumb enough to overexpose a commander, then he'll get blown up for it. If you're not taking the kills when they are offering to you, you're essentially playing worse just to extend the game. I don't find that any fun nor competitive.

The bottom line is this. There is no argument that can convince me that playing this game for 15minutes is more fun than playing this game for 1 hour.

Right then, shall I lock the thread for you?

I posted in general discussion for a reason. To garner discussion and voice my opinion. There is no need to be all high horse about it talking about locking the thread.

No argument can convince me that playing a game for 15 minutes is more fun than playing a game for 60 minutes.

[xclkvnspoijfoisn]

@Kampfkeks500 said in 15minutes of gaming?:

I remember you insulting my teammate during and after the game with that exact accusation.
Every map has axes of symmetry and should be fairly balanced. If someone chooses T2 Mexes and is later in Navy, that's their own fault and/or lack of scouting. A game where both teams build roughly similar numbers of units rarely ends in a quick rollover.

The idea that you don't want to play the game because you're working towards victory (the end of the game) is funny and echoes The Journey vs. the Destination conflict. Obviously most all players are closer to the Destination side, but on that point I understand the frustration when someone's entire gameplan is to make a Corsair Snipe. Then I also ask myself, “why is this fun for you?” But yes, everyone has their own way of playing the game and as long as it's part of the game, there's no need to ask them unkindly why they're not playing my preferred playstyle.

If you want to change your own experience, there are many maps that have few key points and less reclaim and contestable mexes, I think on these maps you will find your desired playstyle more often as opposed to small mapgens.

I see no convincing argument here in favour of a 15 minute game being more fun than a 60 minute game.

[xclkvnspoijfoisn]

@Kilatamoro said in 15minutes of gaming?:

What maps are you playing? The most popular map (Dual Gap) easily lasts 40 minutes.

Traditionally I am a setons player, so it's true what I am saying doesn't completely apply to setons, or as you say gap. Although 15 minute games happen fairly regularly on setons so it too is victim to the 15 minute mentality.

Recently I've been playing a lot of 3v3 and 4v4 tmm though with the occasional random custom mapgen host. Most players in these formats want to win as fast as possible. They want to fulfill the 15 minute rts gaming prophecy because in their mind the sole objective of an rts game is to simply win.

[xclkvnspoijfoisn]

@ZLO said in 15minutes of gaming?:

Looks like something directed to players like me.
When i have started playing i was interested in big units, big explosions, big battles.
i theoretically could let my opponent finish their experimental so we would have experimental fight
or we could just mass as many units as we can and then when we are both ready - attack each other so we will have big army fights. We often played with 2x resources and 20 minute no rush

Then very quickly i got into actual multiplayer with not just friends but random people and 1v1 ladder where goal is to win by any means necessary.
And i still was enjoying the game and was trying to improve.
I no longer care if my opponent is not ready when i am attacking, i probably just go ahead and win the game, if i don't, it will be just "playing with the food" and "bad manners"
So naturally i'd just improve my rating and play with players that would not instantly collapse and we would have an actual fight

The amount of time it take for the battle is no longer relevant to me.
The amount of fighting and interaction with my opponent matters
maybe i can still enjoy some spectacle... like when you have dozens of t4 units and nukes and strat bombers and other stuff but it is like 10% of original excitement.
Now i care more about tactic and strategy my opponent has used. If tactic was creative and interesting it might not matter that game is over before 5 minute mark.

You can try to extend the amount of time by playing bigger maps
if i play 40 km map to artificially extend the game time then it will dilute the experience cause i will just interact more with my own base than with my opponent.
And game turns into 99% game of economy and one player just wins cause he has more stuff and i don't really like that

i enjoy maps where i can interact more with my opponent, kinda like map Eye of the storm.
you can attack by land, by air, by navy, by fast comwalk, can do drops, TML (or TML ACU), t2 land push or t2 hover push, torpedo commander, gun commander push and can even to economy (but can't lose to t2 navy). There also are some fun build orders that rely on stealing reclaim from opponent's side of the map. maybe can even bomb opponnet's reclaim with 1rst bomber. even light assault bots are almost viable

Right now I just try to win and then fun just occurs by itself, if my opponent loses or i lose - then fun ends, but i can just start next game instantly (hopefully)

Edit: instead of letting my opponent to build up an army or giving him time to develop I may use more fun tactic that is suboptimal but i will still play for the win after that

I think you are traditionally a 1v1 player, and my post isn't really aimed at ladder.

Although the post massively applies to ladder since like 98% of games end in 15 minutes or so, but 1v1 is arguably the most competitive format in which players really are there to compete and be the best and win. I would enjoy 1v1's more if every map was 20km because I prefer larger maps that require high macro. Larger maps also somewhat guarantee a longer game too since your 15 minute mindset opponent is going to find it challenging to wrap up a game in 15 minutes. You at least have more breathing space and capacity to try for a longer more fun game. This is impossible to say for a 5x5 map and mostly true for 10x10 as well.

[Deribus]

There are two reasons:

1. I play for the combat. I have little to no interest in playing eco-simulator or sim-city until I have 3 digit mass income. You can do that in single player or even in a spreadsheet. If I really feel like turning my brain off and making a Monkeylord as my first unit I would skip the queue entirely and go do a solo survival or campaign. So say I queue 15 minutes. I can then send my first raids out 5 minutes into the game for 20 minutes of total wait time, or obey some kind of non-aggression pact for 30 minutes for 45 minutes of total wait time. I'll chose the 20 minute wait time every time.
2. I play multiplayer to play against another human playing to the best of their ability. This involves exploiting any gaps they find in my defenses to the best of their ability, and defending against me doing the same. To reiterate the point from section 1, if I didn't want this to be the case I can do campaign, survival, or even games vs AI and skip the queue entirely.

[ZLO]

@Caliber said in 15minutes of gaming?:

I have to agree players spend 30 plus mins in lobby just to desperatly end the game quickly by shift g units, its pretty sad state of play.

i fail to see how this is different from just "not killing enemy commander when given the chance"
and how is that different from losing on purpose?

imagine looking at your ally standing with his superior t1 army next to enemy commander and not killing him just because "it will end game to quickly". Wouldn't that be infuriating? He is 1 click away from wining. He will probably get pinged to death by his team

Sometimes you can look at player and think "he is not even trying to win"
Now i know that people like that actually exist.

At the same time (even if that maybe contradicts my previous words) i can agree that some all-ins are probably lame and are not interesting to play against.
and i respect player's desire to play longer game with t2 and t3

[Caliber]

@ZLO desire to win vs enjoyment from playing

• short games means less time playing and more time in lobby sim, which suggests that you dont enjoy playing but actualy only enjoy the concept of winning.
• long games means more time playing the game you like to play, sometimes although rarely it is possible to enjoy games that you lose if there are fun dynamic aspects to that game.

[xclkvnspoijfoisn]

@Deribus said in 15minutes of gaming?:

There are two reasons:

1. I play for the combat. I have little to no interest in playing eco-simulator or sim-city until I have 3 digit mass income. You can do that in single player or even in a spreadsheet. If I really feel like turning my brain off and making a Monkeylord as my first unit I would skip the queue entirely and go do a solo survival or campaign. So say I queue 15 minutes. I can then send my first raids out 5 minutes into the game for 20 minutes of total wait time, or obey some kind of non-aggression pact for 30 minutes for 45 minutes of total wait time. I'll chose the 20 minute wait time every time.
2. I play multiplayer to play against another human playing to the best of their ability. This involves exploiting any gaps they find in my defenses to the best of their ability, and defending against me doing the same. To reiterate the point from section 1, if I didn't want this to be the case I can do campaign, survival, or even games vs AI and skip the queue entirely.

You kind of miss my point.

You play for combat? Who doesn't? Even if 2 opposing teams are relatively chill and everyone is going for a long game, there is still going to be combat and action throughout the game. The difference is, they are hoping to play for some eventual epic combat later on. Just because people prefer long game does not mean they are playing an eco-sim game. Everyone that says this is kinda silly to be honest. Just because someone is ecoing fast and efficiently does not mean they are not paying attention to the game and what their opponent is doing. The efficient fast eco player is still mindful of the game state and is ready to counter aggression. This is called min-maxing.

And I could say the same about 15 minutes of combat too in regard to a spreadsheet or single player. This argument is silly.

A 20 minute no aggression pact is obviously silly too. And would be quite boring. This is not my point. My point again, is why do players want to end a game as fast as possible. Why do they have more fun playing a game for 15 minutes as opposed to playing a game for 60 minutes.

Is watching a movie for 10 minutes really more enjoyable than watching all the movie?

Would it be more fun participating in a sports activity for 15 minutes and winning, or participating in a sports activity for 60 minutes regardless of the outcome?

[xclkvnspoijfoisn]

@Caliber said in 15minutes of gaming?:

short games means less time playing and more time in lobby sim, which suggests that you dont enjoy playing but actualy only enjoy the concept of winning.

100%

[Deribus]

@xclkvnspoijfoisn said in 15minutes of gaming?:

The difference is, they are hoping to play for some eventual epic combat later on.

I'm not interested in "eventual epic combat later on". 5 mantis shooting at each other is functionally gameplay the same as 5 monkeys shooting at each other. Why bother waiting for monkeys to come online if mantis could give me the same gameplay 30 minutes sooner?

@xclkvnspoijfoisn said in 15minutes of gaming?:

Just because people prefer long game does not mean they are playing an eco-sim game.

It's not always, but often true. I don't know my Dual Gap slots, but many slots are going to be on full T2 mex before they build a combat unit. Some slots might even get to full T3 mex. That is eco sim.

@xclkvnspoijfoisn said in 15minutes of gaming?:

Just because someone is ecoing fast and efficiently does not mean they are not paying attention to the game and what their opponent is doing. The efficient fast eco player is still mindful of the game state and is ready to counter aggression.

Never said they weren't

@xclkvnspoijfoisn said in 15minutes of gaming?:

My point again, is why do players want to end a game as fast as possible.

Two reasons. The first is because I intend to play at full capacity. If the skill difference between myself and my opponent is great enough that the game ends quickly, then that's when the game ends. To artificially drag out the game would by definition mean either I, my opponent, or both are deliberately not winning, which is boring.

Let's say at the 15 minute mark I my opponent has 75% map control and vastly more eco than me. I want him to kill me at that point because there is little to no way for me to recover. Sure he can sit and wait for 30 minutes while I get all T3 eco, but in that time he's going to be ecoing too except much faster because of the map control and eco advantages. Even if I have 200 mass income I'm not winning against a 600 mass income opponent. Those extra 30 minutes would be a waste of both people's time. I'd rather be queueing for the next game than technically in a game but waiting to die.

@xclkvnspoijfoisn said in 15minutes of gaming?:

Is watching a movie for 10 minutes really more enjoyable than watching all the movie?

10 minutes is the whole movie. This isn't a comparison of a 2 hour movie or just a 10 minute clip of the same movie, it's watching 2 hours of a movie that could have been 10 minutes. Have you ever watched the Hobbit trilogy? They tried to extend a book that was shorter than any of the Lord of the Rings books into 3 movies. They accomplished this by filling it with all sorts of garbage and time-wasting nonsense that nobody cares about.

If given the choice of watching a single Lord of the Rings movie or all three Hobbit movies, I would watch Lord of the Rings every time.

[xclkvnspoijfoisn]

@Deribus said in 15minutes of gaming?:

@xclkvnspoijfoisn said in 15minutes of gaming?:

The difference is, they are hoping to play for some eventual epic combat later on.

I'm not interested in "eventual epic combat later on". 5 mantis shooting at each other is functionally gameplay the same as 5 monkeys shooting at each other. Why bother waiting for monkeys to come online if mantis could give me the same gameplay 30 minutes sooner?

5 mantis shooting at eachother is not the same as 5 monkeylords shooting at eachother. Beside which, you'd rarely if ever have a real game scenario where there would be a straight match up of 5 monkeylords vs 5 monkey lords, there would be supporting units and all kinds of other stuff going on most likely.

@xclkvnspoijfoisn said in 15minutes of gaming?:

Just because people prefer long game does not mean they are playing an eco-sim game.

It's not always, but often true. I don't know my Dual Gap slots, but many slots are going to be on full T2 mex before they build a combat unit. Some slots might even get to full T3 mex. That is eco sim.

Call it what you will. Eco is half the game. You don't see "eco players" calling out aggression as "aggression simulator". Or "rush sim" when someone is fulfilling the 15 minute prophecy.

@xclkvnspoijfoisn said in 15minutes of gaming?:

Just because someone is ecoing fast and efficiently does not mean they are not paying attention to the game and what their opponent is doing. The efficient fast eco player is still mindful of the game state and is ready to counter aggression.

Never said they weren't

@xclkvnspoijfoisn said in 15minutes of gaming?:

My point again, is why do players want to end a game as fast as possible.

Two reasons. The first is because I intend to play at full capacity. If the skill difference between myself and my opponent is great enough that the game ends quickly, then that's when the game ends. To artificially drag out the game would by definition mean either I, my opponent, or both are deliberately not winning, which is boring.

Well sure, but you can also take the stance of giving your opponent a chance and allowing everyone to play on and enjoy the game instead of capitalising on the skill difference by ending the game in 15 minutes.

Let's say at the 15 minute mark I my opponent has 75% map control and vastly more eco than me. I want him to kill me at that point because there is little to no way for me to recover. Sure he can sit and wait for 30 minutes while I get all T3 eco, but in that time he's going to be ecoing too except much faster because of the map control and eco advantages. Even if I have 200 mass income I'm not winning against a 600 mass income opponent. Those extra 30 minutes would be a waste of both people's time. I'd rather be queueing for the next game than technically in a game but waiting to die.

In this case you can either recall or leave the game if you feel you have 0 chance of winning. If you have 3x less eco than your opponent that is not a 100% loss. Sure it's a high likelihood of loss but not 100%. The greater mass your enemy has doesn't mean anything if they don't know how to use it and finish the game.

@xclkvnspoijfoisn said in 15minutes of gaming?:

Is watching a movie for 10 minutes really more enjoyable than watching all the movie?

10 minutes is the whole movie. This isn't a comparison of a 2 hour movie or just a 10 minute clip of the same movie, it's watching 2 hours of a movie that could have been 10 minutes. Have you ever watched the Hobbit trilogy? They tried to extend a book that was shorter than any of the Lord of the Rings books into 3 movies. They accomplished this by filling it with all sorts of garbage and time-wasting nonsense that nobody cares about.

10 minutes is not the whole movie at all. I know what you're saying, but this seems like a fallacy. A movie is not just the key points of the movie, the open sequence, some action in the middle and an ending. Movies are an entire narrative, a story arc, that in most cases require a substantial amount of time more than 10 minutes. By this logic you can reduce every movie ever made into a sentence or two with a synopsis. Just make every movie into a 15 second tiktok short no problem. Yes problem. That is not a movie, that is a 15 second ultra boiled down summary of an otherwise long, fun and interesting story.

The main reason to cut the Hobbit book into 3 parts was 1) Money, and 2) Because why the hell not. If you're a proper fan of Tolkien and Middle-Earth you wouldn't complain at all about anything movie adaptation being too long. Maybe you have issues with use of "creative license" or interpretation. But as a proper fan you'd be glad you're seeing Middle-Earth on your screen for long periods of time.

So most Tolkien fans would probably disagree with you that the 3 movie adaptation of the Hobbit story is anything but time-wasting nonsense. They're no lord of the rings trilogy, but they're all still great movies and all received an extended cut release like the former. Because fans want that. They want 4 hour middle earth movies.

If given the choice of watching a single Lord of the Rings movie or all three Hobbit movies, I would watch Lord of the Rings every time.

Sure, there is no debate about this.

[ThomasHiatt]

I don't think playing the game is inherently satisfying. When I play competitive games, I do so because it is satisfying to learn new things, improve at the game, and defeat increasingly stronger opponents. Once the learning and improvement have plateaued the game is no longer fun. There is generally nothing useful to be learned by extending the game time unnecessarily, so the optimal thing to do is win the game and go on to the next stronger opponent where you can actually improve and learn something. If the opponent is strong there will be no way to win in 15 minutes because they do not make game losing mistakes in the first 15 minutes. With stronger and more balanced opponents the game will naturally last longer.

It is a quantity vs quality debate, which gamers seem to be particularly confused about. Gamers typically want to spend money to receive a product which will occupy the largest amount of their time. Alternatively, you can spend time in order to receive concentrated quality experiences. If you value your time then you would prefer to watch many good, unique, short films as opposed to 4 hours of bloated fan service. What do you value more between time, money, and quality of experience? Do you just want something to keep you occupied until you die or do you want to have a variety of quality experiences? I tend to feel bad about myself when I think I've "wasted" a large amount of my life, but I actually think that all approaches are fine and it doesn't really matter in the end.

[Sainse]

Wrong dychotomy. It's not "t1 gameplay vs t1/t2/t3/t4 gameplay". It's "turtle gameplay vs dynamic gameplay". Dynamic games generally don't last as long cause any mistake gets punished immediately, so games tend to be shorter. But long dynamic games are the best.