Exploring video game glitches
I mentioned last week that my older son, Robert, had started blogging about his iPhone, programming, and Linux. Well, not to be outdone, my 11-year-old son David started blogging this week as well, except he's focusing on the vintage video games that he collects. And over the weekend, he wrote an interesting post on an aspect of video games I hadn't known about: glitches.
Many of us would call video game glitches by a more pejorative name: bugs. That's because unlike game easter eggs, they usually were never intended to be in the games, but instead snuck in because of logic or graphics flaws in the code. But with the increasing sophistication of physics engines and elaborate layout designs in games, glitches have become prevelent, subtle, and entertaining. Some gamers now focus on seeing how far they can permute gameplay through the use of glitches, and the phenomenon isn't limited to console games; glitches are often found and exploited in arcade games as well. There's a great presentation of glitching examples over at Wikipedia.
Personally, I enjoy observing and analyzing the video game industry, but I love the fact that up and coming gamers like David are interested in blogging about it even more. Any technology that gets an 11-year-old boy writing for recreation is a net plus in my book. And who knows? It might even boost his middle school English grades if he keeps it up.
Many of us would call video game glitches by a more pejorative name: bugs. That's because unlike game easter eggs, they usually were never intended to be in the games, but instead snuck in because of logic or graphics flaws in the code. But with the increasing sophistication of physics engines and elaborate layout designs in games, glitches have become prevelent, subtle, and entertaining. Some gamers now focus on seeing how far they can permute gameplay through the use of glitches, and the phenomenon isn't limited to console games; glitches are often found and exploited in arcade games as well. There's a great presentation of glitching examples over at Wikipedia.
Personally, I enjoy observing and analyzing the video game industry, but I love the fact that up and coming gamers like David are interested in blogging about it even more. Any technology that gets an 11-year-old boy writing for recreation is a net plus in my book. And who knows? It might even boost his middle school English grades if he keeps it up.
posted by Carl Howe at
9:18 AM
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