I’d like to talk about artificial scarcity, and how I think it is generally a poor solution. I should begin, though, by an overview of True Scarcity, and its effects on our lives.

True Scarcity, like real things have. Resources are scarce, time, energy, materials, space, attention. People throw around “post-scarcity” as an achievable goal, but depending on how you draw the threshold it could have already happened, or it could never happen.

Artificial Scarcity has to do with arbitrarily limited things, like CCGs, limited runs, and modern currencies. Mimics True Scarcity in order to reproduce its effects. Can be marginally useful (currency), or deceptive (CCG). I don’t like it.

Narrative Scarcity? Resources limited to form a cohesive story (fictional True Scarcity or contrived Artificial Scarcity). Intrinsically artificial in reality (no reason the storyteller can’t solve scarcity by fiat), but percieved as true in context. Mis-used in either direction can lead to story collapse.

Artificial scarcity occurs a lot in games, but aside from people being familiar with this way of thinking, and as a tool for exploring true scarcity, I don’t see the advantage. For example, there is (effectively) no marginal cost to distributing DLC to all game owners. Or to releasing all games into the public domain. At the limit, this ties back to the “win” button. Artificially limiting story progression by game performance is… well, artificial scarcity.

A “quest” is a stand-in for AI imperative communication.

Speculative history of quests. Started with individual goals. Then transitioned to chains (multiple sequential goals), then to laundry lists (paralell goals) (Many small quests can be rolled into one big one). Very few are reactive to player performance and world state. Completing a quest often resets effective world-state. Rewards are generally in-game money, equipment, relationship points (a different form of currency), and experience (which doesn’t make sense, wouldn’t you gain experience based on how well you performed, and what you did, rather than whether you returned to the quest-giver).

Could be combined with communication (deceit) and bartering. Certainly need to be more reactive.

The structure of a game sets the stage.

The semantics of a game sets the atmosphere.

The abilities of players and characters dictate the kind of stories that can be told in-game.

Too few abilities stifles expression. Too many abilities stifles creativity.

Too few semantics stifles expression. Too many semantics stifles creativity.

Too much structure stifles expression. Too little structure stifles creativity.

I wish I could recall the fervor of the ideas with which I began this post. Perhaps too much structure.

These are all various angles one may hold a game. In order to examine it. In order to evaluate it. Play is the emergent behavior of an intelligence in contact with a healthy balance between the three.

The player really needs to have input in the game. As much input as possible really. The previous article about AI Assistance in mind, much of this input should be optional as well, but the options should be available.

Input is one of the defining characteristics of a game. Can we simply expose all aspects of the game world to the player? How much is too much? Continue reading →

Conflict is only meaningful when the outcome is in question.

Often, computer game challenges are against foes who have a noticeably different in-game status from the player character. The player character has depth, while the foes are hardly characters at all. It isn’t even a challenger. It’s just a challenge. Even the most difficult challenges, the “boss” foes, rarely have any out-of-plot motivation, duty, or even activity that they engage in. There are several causes for this (not that it’s any excuse) all of which are more or less surmountable.

Character background is difficult to convey and generate.

The rise of multi-player direct competition games has illuminated this difficulty even more by demonstrating what happens when player characters to compete against each-other.

It doesn’t mean anything to challenge a non-entity, nor does it signify to crush an inferior. “Boss” characters are often meant as a game-play challenge, but as they are presented as characters, they often fail on that merit.

Reducing the player’s character to the level of other in-game characters is important for verisimilitude. Giving the player special powers makes them special, but also adds exceptional expectations which can often not be met.

The player should compete against evenly matched foes. Whether this is symmetrical or not, there must be a balance of forces or there is no need for contest.

games are not stories, but they do need momentum.

History building up to the point of interaction. NPCs and environment needs to support this momentum.

Good manuverability (high player agency) in the narrative trajectory.

Balance between the two, if too much manuverability then history means nothing. If too much momentum then the player’s choices don’t matter.

Many games neither justify the player’s character’s actions, nor give them options to make real choices.

What you want, what you can do, or what you have. Which is more important? Each informs the other. Each is superior to the others. Each serves the others. They all work together.

There are continually trends to move games (and everything else) toward a focus on one or the other of these aspects. An exclusive obsession with “what you have” is the basis of materialism. Fascination with “what you can do” leads to endless labor. Fixation on “what you want” produces day-dreaming and dissatisfaction. Continue reading →

The current trend is to make games ever more concrete, but we must not forget abstraction. Generally speaking, abstract games challenge deduction, while concrete ones challenge induction. Put another way, games with lots of specific rules and solid metaphors force the player to form their own generalizations and strategies, while games with a few simple rules and few examples force the player to devise effective applications and tactics. Continue reading →

Learning == Gaming

I appreciate Keith Burgun’s work on defining the word “game” (See this post for a good outline. To summarize, KB defines games in terms of the layered context “Toy, Puzzle, Contest, Game” where each successive element is a sub-set of the last) but I have arrived at a slightly different objective space and corresponding terminology. I’ve addressed this topic informally already, (and the topic of the definition of game even more informally) but it bears a more thorough look.

In short: Games are active models designed to allow the user to cheaply learn important information about costly systems.

Or, put another way:

Games are simulations of serious things too expensive to play with. Continue reading →

Download Audio

Oh, that’s an easy one. AAA means you’re at the top of the alphabetical listing. Or, put another way, you care about marketing more than anything else. Continue reading →

Download Audio

The perception layer (in my terminology (which is what I use to communicate)) is an intermediary between reality and memory. It models the fact that, when you perceive something, your perception doesn’t always match what’s really there. In fact, it never matches it perfectly. Occasionally, perception and reality are far divergent.

I think of the perception layer as a piece of glass. If it is smooth and clean, you can look through it easily. If the glass is clouded, painted, or covered in dirt, your perception is going to be obstructed. Even worse, if the glass is uneven, warped, or otherwise malformed it can give a clear but distorted view of the other side.

Fog of War is a common example of a perception layer in RTS games. Continue reading →

Download Audio

I’ve written on this topic before, but I was re-inspired by comments in this blog post.

On the topic of AAA games and visuals. I really like the image of building a monolith of cash and setting it on fire. It works on so many levels. I don’t even resent people doing this. It’s their money, they’re free to do what they like with it. What I resent is being told that watching a pretty currency bonfire is a life-changing experience and everyone should show up. It’s the kind of lie that, as was said, has blatant disregard for the intellect of the audience. Continue reading →

Download Audio

If you do A and B then you can try doing C. Oh, but you have to do A and B every time you want to do C. No, you can’t skip those parts. It’s core gameplay!

Seriously, what’s the deal with this? Can’t I prove to you that I’m capable of these tasks? I mean, collect some statistics on my performance or something. Even degrade it by 10%, or 50% for that matter, just let me use MY performance for the “auto calculate” instead of the developer’s expectations or the AI’s abilities.

I’ve already written on this topic before. Hopefully this article will offer another angle of approach to the concept of not wasting the player’s time. Continue reading →

Download Audio

We need this. Badly.

If it explains how it won, then you’ve just made a self-updating tutorial and walkthru.

If you can choose which part of the game it works on, then you’ve just implemented a “skip this annoying/frustrating part” button.

If it spoils your intricately woven masterpiece of a story-line… you’re working in the wrong medium. If it ruins multi-player, then turn it off during competitions. Continue reading →

Download Audio

A game can not be (and indeed should not be) a perfect copy of real life. Some things are different (fantasy), but most are simplified. This is good. We play games, in part, to escape from the complexity of normal life and focus on a few relevant details. We desire to fit the whole problem in our heads, and most of us have heads too small for the real world.

And one can only do so much. Ideally game designers could include everything in the world, but our minds are not yet broad enough (nor our game systems powerful enough) to do this. So, since some form of simplification is both desired and required, we must ask, “What do we simplify?” Continue reading →

Download Audio

Fledgeling is super huge. Everything from the firmament to the flagella is in there. So how do you handle all of that stuff?

Continue reading →

Download Audio

No wait, let me explain! I like my games iconic and clean. I don’t want a cinematic experience, I want to be challenged. If you love the fancy eye feast offered by modern games, that’s great… and you should probably skip this article. Chess and Dwarf Fortress are more my style. So, that’s where I’m coming from; That’s also where I’m going.

Graphics should clearly present the game state and indicate the player’s options. Visuals which lend a sense of place, atmosphere, and proper gravity to a game world are admirable. When I say “‘Good Graphics’ are bad” I’m talking about facet count, normal projection, specularity maps, lens flares, and pre-rendered cutscenes. That stuff is great in movies. But games don’t need it. Games don’t need “good graphics” to be good games. Continue reading →

Download Audio

Some games are fully chance based. Some games are fully skill based.
But some games are both, and life is like this too.
The problem is when one is disguised as the other. Often chance is disguised as skill, to make the player try to figure out how to do better. The other case, where skill is disguised as chance, is far rarer.

Most games involve both chance and skill. A game that is totally based on luck is merely a lottery. However, even games where luck and ability are mixed can be deceptive. Most often, chance is disguised as skill, but it can go the other way as well. Continue reading →

Download Audio

Games are all about conflict. Whether it is conflict between separate players, or between players and the game’s rules, there is a tension of desires. Someone wants what they do not have. Often, it is something that someone else has (see all zero sum games). Without conflict of some sort, there is no game. Even the most peaceful and creative of games embody this axiom.

A conflict is all about understanding yourself and your opponent, using your strengths against the opponent’s weakness, and maintaining the will to win even after sustaining injuries. Lest this description sound too martial, allow me to give a “peaceful” example. Building a block tower is a conflict. It is the player (the builder) against the game (physics and gravity). Continue reading →

Download Audio

Materials vary. Situations vary. History, performance, results may vary. Whenever you know something, or see something, or remember something, or do something you’re experiencing a bit of slop. Nothing is mathematically certain.

This is one of the reasons games of chance are so attractive to us. We deal with small randomness all the time, and bringing it out into the open and freely admitting “I have no idea how this will turn out” is satisfying in a way. We hide and ignore the randomness in so many other situations that letting it out feels right. “It’s about time” we seem to say.

But chance isn’t everything. In fact, chance is only the lack of control on top of our skill. If there were no intent, no goal, there would be no chance. Continue reading →

Download Audio

We long, with good reason, for things to make sense.

I recall my frustration with Fable when, upon finally reaching Snowspire Village, everyone speaks a totally understandable language. Plus, even though they have been out of contact with everyone else for “a long time” it’s no big deal when a foreigner arrives and re-opens the Cullis Gate. And where have they been getting food all this time? And clothes? Why haven’t they all starved to death? It just made no sense at all.

For me, the game world is the most important part of a game. Continue reading →

Download Audio

… which means that games are based on reality. Well, okay, someone’s imagination of reality.

A game (computer games included) is a way to explore experience. What is it like to lead an army? Chess can answer that, to a point. A game is a kind of metaphor. It is a tool to find the ways in which complicated things can be made simple, and simple things made complex.

But people’s imaginations interfere with both their experience and their memory of reality. Continue reading →

Download Audio

Travel is a common mechanic in nearly every game. Moving pieces in space is a powerful symbol for changing the state of a system. Walking is a familiar experience, and draws us into the game world.

However, computer games commonly enforce a strict method of transit, with the player’s experience lasting as long as the character’s. Say you want to walk to the doughnut shop. You’ve got to walk down the drive way, go a ways through the neighborhood, travel a few blocks through the commercial sector, and finally walk through the parking lot (maybe you should have driven your car!) to the doughnut shop. Maybe it’s fun the first time… Continue reading →

Download Audio

Don’t make the player do busywork. Anything the player can do easily but can’t avoid is busywork. Our subconscious takes care of these tasks in real life. Build a subconscious into your game for crying out loud!

What if there were a “Turning the key” minigame every time you start a car in GTA. Absurd? What about lock picking? Busywork shows up all over the place; Players largely put up with it; They shouldn’t.

• Tutorial: It has to be long and boring!? People are forced to complete worksheets at school, but this usually requires the threat of actual physical pain. Games do not have this luxury. Make your tutorial enjoyable, and let the player quit when they get the idea. Continue reading →

Download Audio

This article was originally written as a guest article for Jay Barnson’s blog. This version is slightly edited, but supports the same core concept.

Traditional storytelling has no place in games.

Tall order? Okay, here goes. Why are a lot of “story games” these days just Simon Says with cut-scenes? Why is a good DM more engaging than fully animated AAA graphics? Why do we keep getting so many stupid stories in otherwise well executed games? The answer lies in the nature of storytelling and games. Continue reading →