"Video games have made you tolerant of bad animation..."

In a previous class, Prof. Leeper made the statement that video games, which usually have lower quality animation compared to films, have made us tolerant of bad animation in general. At least when it comes to video games, I'd say he's right, but not for the reason he thinks.

When judging an animated films, you only have the storytelling, the acting, and the animation to critique. But with video games, you have more facets to consider, such as mechanics  and frame rate as well as the storytelling (if applicable), and as a gamer, I tend to weigh some of these other aspects as slightly more important than how the game looks. 

For me, the most important aspect of a video game is mechanics, or how the game plays. You can have a great story and beautiful animation, but if you game is hard to control and frustrating, I'm not going to enjoy it. Connected to this is how enjoyable the game is. For instance, I once played a game about fighter jets. The mechanics were great; the game ran smoothly, and the controls were responsive and intuitive. However, while the mechanics were solid, it just wasn't very enjoyable, as most of the game was just circling the enemy and firing seeker missiles at them. 

The next major facet of a video game is the story (though this doesn't apply to sports games like Madden which aren't trying to tell a story). As far as storytelling goes, The Last of Us is one of, if not the best video games ever written. This post-apocalyptic survivor-horror game takes place 20 years after an outbreak of a strain of the Cordyceps fungus (which actually exists) makes the jump to humans. The story follows hardened survivor Joel (voiced and motion captured by Troy Baker) as he escorts young Ellie (voiced and motion captured by Ashley Johnson) across the US. The game's narrative has been praised for its characterization, subtext, exploration of the human condition as well as depiction of LGBT characters, and has won awards for just about every facet of the game. In addition to all of this, the game itself looks spectacular. However, in order to achieve this level of quality and detail and have the game run smoothly, the developers did have to drop the frame rate down to 30fps.

Frame rate affects how "smooth" the game looks when playing; the higher the frame rate, the better. This is especially important in multiplayer games, where being able to make small adjustments gives you an advantage, and having higher frame rates allows this. Now I know when Prof. Leeper mentioned the Call of Duty series in class it got a few snickers and groans, but in this respect it really shines by consistently delivering 60fps, even at the expense of graphic fidelity, and still remains the measuring stick against which other competitive multiplayer experiences are compared. Though from the previews of the latest installment, I'm not sure that's there's even that much of a dip in graphic fidelity anymore.

From Ghosts, the previous installment by Infinity Ward

From the latest installment Advanced Warfare by Sledgehammer Games  

Additionally, in terms of things to do at least, each Call of Duty game does have plenty to offer. The previous installment Ghosts had a story campaign, competitive online multiplayer, local offline matches with bots, private matches, a separate co-op mode with its own story and mechanics, a squad multiplayer mode with bots, as well as a co-op horde mode.

In summary, the reason gamers might be more lenient toward lesser quality animation is that when it comes to video games, there are more factors to consider and most of them have a bigger impact on the quality of a video game than the animation itself.