484: Flash Games

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Flash Games
Although...who else can't wait for them to incorporate that Wiimote head-tracking stuff into games? Man, the future's gonna be *awesome*.
Title text: Although...who else can't wait for them to incorporate that Wiimote head-tracking stuff into games? Man, the future's gonna be *awesome*.

Explanation[edit]

Dedicated hardcore gamers will often indulge in expensive, top-of-the-line equipment to get the most out of their video games.

Adobe Flash was a software platform allowing multimedia applications in the browser. Flash became a popular choice for game developers, since playing Flash games only requires a browser and the free cross-platform Flash runtime environment. Randall was right that Flash games are quite addictive, and gamers would have found them more engaging than anything that runs on expensive (dedicated) gaming systems.

Nowadays, years after the making of this comic, Flash has been completely phased out by modern browsers in favor of HTML5 + JavaScript. The open-source movement especially prefers the latter, since no proprietary browser plugins are needed to run it. That said, the sheer number of Flash games that have been made over the last decade means that Flash will likely hold a special place in many gamers' hearts for the foreseeable future, to the point where "Flash game" has become a catch-all term for any browser game.

The comic may also be commenting that some modern games are too focused on graphics and not enough on gameplay.

The title text mentions the Wiimote, the standard controller for the Nintendo Wii video game console. Wii games are usually controlled by tracking the movement and orientation of the handheld Wiimote, but Johnny Lee devised a method to use a Wiimote to track the position of the users head and demonstrated this with a desktop VR display. It should be noted that this is not the same as the body tracking that is available from Sony and Microsoft with the EyeToy and Kinect respectively, neither of which has earned any real praise as a practical gaming controller.

Transcript[edit]

[On the left side of the panel are a massive TV screen, large speakers, and similar devices, all connected to a "Game Station 20,000" console. Cueball, however, is over on the right side of the panel, on a modestly-sized computer.]
Cueball: Ooh, I think I've got it figured out! Okay, one more hour.
Beep Plunk
The most powerful gaming systems in the world still can't match the addictiveness of tiny in-browser Flash games.


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Discussion

http://reddawn.net/quilt/games/QCon/QCon.html ‎173.245.55.222 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

The explanation needs to explain the title text. 108.162.216.45 23:25, 11 November 2013 (UTC)

Yes, you are right. No time for me so far, maybe this comic should be on top at the "Today's incomplete explanation of the day" for one day more... --Dgbrt (talk) 00:37, 12 November 2013 (UTC)
Already got it for you guys 199.27.128.66 07:33, 12 November 2013 (UTC)

Am I missing something or are you looking too hard for an explanation? To me, it seems as simple as what it says. There are amazing gaming systems, but a lot of flash games are way more addictive. So the character (Cueball I guess he's been called here) simply is telling himself that he'll only play for one more hour before playing with his new console. The joke being that in an hour, he will say the same thing again. And again. And so on. That's all there is to this. 173.245.63.180 07:32, 12 November 2013 (UTC)

Games are what happens to nerds while they are waiting for their lives.
Comics are what happen to me when I am waiting to be right again.
My most tiresome trait is my effort to be correct.
One day I will run out of comics.

I used Google News BEFORE it was clickbait (talk) 00:37, 31 January 2015 (UTC)


Note the Wiimote blutacked to the television. --162.158.2.222 02:26, 2 April 2016 (UTC)

This is as true today as it was in 2008. I spend more hours on little flash games than I do actual video games. International Space Station (talk) 05:20, 22 April 2016 (UTC)

IMO, Flash games are more fun than current games, I literally spend a few hours playing Flash games while I only play a good 20 minutes on console games. Boeing-787lover 14:08, 22 November 2017 (UTC)

Game Examples

Hey, anyone have any good games? Link below. 108.162.246.119 04:14, 25 October 2016 (UTC)

krunker.io is quite nice, but diep.io and slither.io are some of the best (although be warned, diep.io has a surprisingly high skill ceiling). Beanie (talk) 12:05, 26 March 2021 (UTC)