Five Words Or Less

Single Player First Person Shooter Maps and Mods for Half Life 1, 2 and 3

I’ve decided to start a little project. Any mods and maps I play, I’m going to review them but because I always want something different from other websites, there is a twist. The review has to be five words or less. This might seem easy but in many ways it’s a lot harder than a normal review. The words will have to be chosen very carefully and I hope it may stimulate a more considered approach.

I would also like to suggest/request/challenge PlanetPhillip readers to attempt to do the same. I will be ruthless when it comes to approving any reviews. Attempts like “This map Sucks big time” or “Could not get any worse!” are completely missing the point. You have to be clever and insightful. Start with any map or mod you want, please don’t wait for me to start! Good Luck.

One more point: These reviews SHOULD NOT REPLACE a normal review, just supplement it.

Background

Ok, I mentioned that I would post something about the background to this idea, so here it is.

It’s really a direct port of the 5 Word Speech from the recent Webby awards. However, it has its root in a couple of other projects that I find interesting. Firstly, there is the Mayfly Project where people had to describe their past year in 24 words. A little after discovering that I found the Quake Haiku Project which had me twisting words until sleep seemed a distant goal. Lastly we come to Le Ton beau de Marot: In Praise of the Music of Language by Douglas Hofstadter which while not directly related to five word reviews certain got my thinking about our use of words.

About this entry

Published:: 19th June 2006 at 7:44 pm

Category:: Phillip's Blog

Responses:: 11 Comments (add)

Joe 20th June 2006 at 22:07 1

Sounds lazy if you ask me. Maybe good as a summary at the end of the review, or as a way of catergorising them using set words (Search for all games/levels with an ‘Atmospheric’ or ‘Chilling’ tag), but in terms of actual reviewing you can’t hope to reach enough depth in 5 words.

Besides, its a bit silly to have a website designed to praise and examine game genres as a art form and to provide interesting news and reviews, if you only decide to limit yourself that much. You might cut yourself on the irony.
Passerbywhoplayshalflife 21st June 2006 at 00:48 2

CTA:

Flawed masterpiece too many combine
planetphillip 21st June 2006 at 18:22 3

Well, I beg to differ Joe, but respect your opinion. IMHO too often a review is trying to show his or her clever observational skills and witty remarks. Present company ecepted of course

Perhaps I should have called it an experiment rather than a project. I don’t review too many maps and mods, I feel my talents lie in other areas, but thought it might be fun to try.

You make an excellent point about the tags. Could be a REALLY useful feature. I’ll play around with some ideas and see what I can come up with.

Regarding your last point, IF all the reviews and commentaries were limited to five words then I would agree with you but since it’s just a little bit of fun then I’m not too worried. I’ve never been afraid of experimenting because it often leads to new things. As shown by your excellent suggestion of tags.

BTW, I’ve a added the background to this experiment.

PWPH, I read all the comments in email form to approve them. Initially I missed the CTA at the top and thought, that sounds like CTA. Which of course gives us an opportunity for a game:
Readers write the review in five words or less and we (Me and the other readers) have to guess the mod.
Migandi 22nd June 2006 at 03:08 4

Half life 2:
Linear,prettier,dumb,driving,game

Oblivion:
Stonking,Stunning,deep,orgasmic,gameathon

Fable:
Humourous,witty,fresh,british,rpg
planetphillip 22nd June 2006 at 14:15 5

Thanks for your contibutions Migandi but I was thinking for of combination rather than just five adjectives.

Half-Life 2:
Looked nice but lacked immersion
fitzroy_doll 23rd June 2006 at 10:47 6

This all sounds like haiku.

In fact, maybe this is how I will submit my comments from now on:

HL2

Light mass and shadow
look real in this outdoor world
weapons are still toys

Doom 3

Another great game
with no imagination
look out behind you

Coastline to Atmosphere

One year of hard work
produces much bad design
should have been tested
Goddess Alyria 22nd January 2007 at 15:15 7

Fluffy won’t like this at all. His poor brain may explode if he reviews in 5 words or less.

It does sound like fun & sometimes you need fun things to do. As for you game, I think it would be extremely challenging (aka HARD) to guess a mod/map just based on those 5 words or less. Oooh, fun, fun, fun!
Goddess Alyria 22nd January 2007 at 15:17 8

Oh, I see this was first posted in June of 2006. I don’t think many people wanted to play Phillip. :p Poor sports!
Ad3 21st September 2007 at 02:33 9

it’s not lazy at all.. you won’t know how difficult and fun at the same time it is until you try it.
damn, you have a lot of great ideas! (after taking the sitemap for a little random reading; and the time is now 3:30 AM) I think you should promote them a lot more, and/or make them hold the headline for a couple of days
planetphillip 21st September 2007 at 10:00 10

planetphillip Said:

I think you should promote them a lot more, and/or make them hold the headline for a couple of days

Easier said than done. There’s almost too many features to promote.

I had actually forgotten about this idea and may use it on the next few mods or maps I review.

I agree it’s not being lazy. It’s trying to think in a different way and doesn’t have to replace a full, detailed review.
mel 24th September 2007 at 20:55 11

Ok, will give it a try and include something on these line in future reviews.