The 1-to-1

This is something I wrote a year or two ago, that I am putting here for my records. Enjoy.

It covers a couple of concepts that I find interesting, and would like to put in my designs. It covers a wide range of things. The most important concept focuses on how the player’s actions should affect the game-world. This topic is a very important one. Designers often get this one wrong.

Co-existence in an ecosystem

An entire ecosystem. Beatles scurrying from prying hands that are forever scanning the ground in bursts of hungry delirium. The trees and the mountains, the predators and the prey.

Actual bodies interacting beneath the surface. Workers have lives and the pressure of daily routine and bosses leaning on them adds up. Any system, such as a crew, exists in a balance. If you press down hard in one area it fluctuates in another. Even if the spotlight of the story shines on a small area, the superstructure that defines the world continues to change. Characters are affected by the changes endlessly and their reactionary behaviours will always be shown or insinuated by the story you tell.

You have to make sense of their world. Place the characters in there, give them a series of events that fit together to respond to, and have them respond in a way that gives them an interesting and consistent personality – one that fits together in your mind as clear and reasonable.

Problems that reflect reality

What if – just work with me here – I wrote a game about characters who had _actual_ _fucking_ problems. Like problems that actual people have to solve on a regular basis. I can’t even imagine what these would be and I deal with them on such a regular basis. This is what media does. I suppose I can always read about these sorts of things in the papers, in history, in every piece of literature and television I know of. I just have to look for the clarity under all the garbage.

Sisko has to let go of the chase for a defecting subordinate, who fooled him and his entire crew. He’s been pulled off the case. He has skills and the respect of his peers and subordinates  but sometimes that’s not enough. He’s not good enough for the task. He had plenty of opportunity to get his ducks in a row, time he used to implicitly gloat through his confidence to his friends. But it apparently wasn’t enough. All around him the signals were there. He should’ve seen them and he didn’t.

That’s a real problem. There’s many in Star Trek.

Creating the gap (personal/player motivation)

Mind the gap. There’s a gap between a player’s expectations of how the game should progress. And then there’s the reality, imposed by a beast or some other obstacle. The environment changes and creates a rift in the player’s mind. He wants to see a resolution.

What is the greatest assumption, the most powerful idea a player wishes to grasp onto? I think it should be personal. I think it should be global. I think it should encompass who the player is and what he values. Harmony and companionship.

I value solitude, and the struggle for brilliance. I dream about all the people I care about, and (potentially) will care about, and my ravenous desire to exist in their service. I live out my beliefs straight from my core, and light up the world with my passion to do what’s right for them.

When I’m alone in my imagination I feel bravery and focus. I think about the windy struggle to survive in a frozen landscape. The elements wear me down but I continue to survive. I have no indecision. There’s just freedom, and I push on. I’m calm. I’m aware. I don’t complain. I’m becoming one with nature. I forget about the trivialities of life.

Maybe the player wants to be together with his ideals – my ideals. He wants what I want. I lay it out for him. Clear-headed competence. His goals are simple.

Then he wants to retain social position among his peers. He wants to command a certain amount of respect, to be listened to, to be accepted for certain aspects of his personality. He wants them to sometimes do as he says, occasionally laugh when he makes mistakes, to have certain expectations of him and to always look at him like he actually exists, that his opinions and expressions are real and personally significant to them for their nature alone.

He wants to be a part of something, for real, as himself. He wants to become part of an event, and reach its conclusion and have a story to remember. He wants to live.

The event becomes a part of him. It becomes a part of others that he respects and listens to. It becomes a part of the world he lives in, and feels permanent in a way. It opens doors for possible futures and can never be repeated.

The 1-to-1

I love the idea of a 1-to-1 between a player’s emotional and technical output and the game world. Everything is recorded, nothing is left out.

The imaginary world of nerds and introverts that evolves over a gaming session is difficult to build. It requires practice and directed motivation. And it’s necessary for comprehending a game. How does a Mario player link together his playing attempts, into a story that has his personality carved into it? By keeping an active record of what happened inside the game and inside himself. He links the screen to his imagination and creates a fictional reality to participate in.

Non introverts don’t have the fictional reality skill. They need practice in order to develop it. And in the duration of practice they need guidance and training wheels to prop themselves up. Something has to present the fictional story to them. They need to be able to see and hear outside of themselves what hard-core gamers have always felt inside.

The hard-core need to hear and see what their compatriots have always felt in genres and experiences they’re not as familiar with.

If I want to build a game that’s complex and engaging and that anyone can play, I have to show everyone how to play. This is done through the “1-to-1”. The player internalizes that relationship then I move on to more advanced material. Slowly I internalize everything that has to be in-order to understand how to approach and enjoy the game.

The 1-to-1 is significant. It gives me the freedom to build a world that encompasses and focuses on whatever is worthy. There’s a lot in the universe to be inspired by, and the 1-to-1 opens the door to all of it. I can go out and scavenge for ideas at any time. But first I’ll look within myself.

It’s hard to write straight from the heart. Assume the character is involved in some sort of conflict. He desires to exist. As he does so the world wears on him. His stamina drains. Snow piles on his head, the winds steals his strength. He has to keep moving or freeze to death. The warmth from nearby shelters beckon to him. But they’re often far away and too insubstantial to serve for a long time. The rains come, and he becomes stuck in the dark. He feels himself feezing in the blackness, blind, with the fading sense of who he is in the world.

The avatar represents you as an individual  If it dies, the game is over and you restart somewhere new as somebody else. Though the residue of your past experience stays with you, and textures your next journey. Maybe your new body rises from the ashes of the old, or is grown from a plant that absorbs it’s essence. You are similar to your old self, but time has passed and your abilities are not the same as they were. Much has to be redone, and you have to do it better or suffer the same fate. You live with your mistakes. They hinder your progress, and in proportion to their significance. Even death is no escape. The severity of your failure is indicated well. And it is emergent from the principles of play already obvious to you. The consequences of your behaviour are natural and not surprising, and they are always interesting.

You desire mastery over the environment, enough to be yourself confidently. You want to engage in the actions that are needed for survival, and do so with clarity, elegance and intuition. You desire control over the situation, to control it in your own way, and succeed clearly where others might have failed, and where you might have failed before. You want the sense that what you are doing is really you, and that you exist in that world. “Throw whatever you’ve got at me and I’ll take it down. My spirit desires more. I’ll conquer, and ravage, and skate through whatever you have.” You want to feel that the world is yours, because you can handle it, and you can handle anything else.

Well-defined challenges

What problems does the world present asking you to master? What elements of your intuition does it tax? What kind of situations is it like?

Is it careful study and resolution? Is it problem-solving and dedication? Is it the endurance of doing a good job so many times that any problem begins to crumble?

I think it has to do with my own pursuits, the things that matter to me the most. I obviously want to pursue a problem tirelessly, eating away at it in the tiniest of fragments until I finally break through. I want to use all of my senses to become one with the problem. I want to be overwhelmed with difficulty and overcome all odds.

And I want to study. And I want to dance carefully, watching an entity unfold before me, learning from it, and striking at its heart. I want to absorb patterns and shapes and ethical arguments. I want to bend to the will of the world. And then I want to control it.

Maybe I want to think about what it is that I want to engage in?

Thinking about logic puzzles, interpretation of artistic expressions, movement, memory, spatial relations, timing, individuals, animals, nature and animals, societies. Start with the simplest. Why? Because simpler is easier. And maybe simpler challenges allow me to prototype a world of challenges more quickly.

Zelda uses spatial reasoning to navigate: throw a variety of enemies at you, gives you ways to counter-attack, and allows deduction of likely points to head to next. It offers timing and movement patterns to platform and combat across an area, and adds tone and spatial segmenting with color and design. One space looks different from another to indicate its relevance and to create identity. You are engaged in all of these things simultaneously. An experience is controlled by altering the variables of each construction. Re-tracking pads it sometimes, but also offers re-use and small mental activities during, and after, the gain of familiarity.

Mario’s challenges are found in the same sort of timing, positioning, and spatial reasoning problems used in Zelda. But they are more varied and nuanced, and their execution is more expressive. You, as a player, have a desire to express yourself in the most personal way, and this desire is given to you with methods inherent in the way Mario moves. Elegant motions are obviously interesting when executed, and they give more control to the player through the mechanics already available. Proper play is rewarded with further proper play (and easily dispatched challenges). The power and appeal of precision jumping becomes obvious simply by doing it, and enemies serve to accentuate it; they are like punctuation on Mario’s sentences. You already have a desire to say something. The enemies and interactables only confirm that what you’ve said was worth saying. That’s game design. Holy shit.

What is it that makes Mario like that? You’re given by the game tools to express yourself in many ways. The most interesting expressions require the most control. And they double as the most effective ways for defeating enemies and passing challenges. The variety of choices are expressed inversely by the design of the levels, which are simple to look at and complicated to explore. You’re left to figure out the nuances of the game on your own, not like doing that is hard; you’re always repeating the basics.

You want the player to do something.

Naruto, Star Trek, Sherlock Holmes, Band of Brothers, The Wire.

War and micro social-systems

Nog relays commands. Sisko gives orders. Dax drives during this while analyzing and determining the best flight pattern. It’s a ship in space, rolling with the wind.

What’s so interesting about things happening simultaneously? Being drowned in the decisions of your peers. Layers of stuff coming at you, building to a crescendo.

Grow to lead a team in a war. Gain the skills necessary to combat, manage, communicate, and all-around affect the behavioral patterns of everyone you command, report to, and interact with. Learn to form and maintain true dependencies with your fellows. Be responsible for the integration of the team(s) you command. Be prepared to lose your station, your status, your team, and anything that can be gained.

Execute hunts and pursuits.

Garak and Worf travel together to uncover the mystery of the Cardassian help message through dangerous waters. They encounter a surprise (amidst the development of their relationship) that spells big news for the people back home. Kira and Dax argue over interesting details of pregnancy, taking sides that reflect themselves well. I wonder about how the news will reach them, if it will reach them, and how they will react. They each have a personal stake in the safety of the two travelers  and both a personal and professional stake in the safety of the station and quadrant. The whole cast threatens to mobilize. There’s a great deal of tension in the air (my air). Levels of interactivity and influence square off against each other, and the possibilities run through my mind. This is exciting. A plot-line built well on the fundamentals of characters, setting, micro- and macro-situation.

Action/RPG game combinations

Samurai surgeon. Mario meets Prince of Persia controls. Shadow Complex / Metal Gear Solid meets Ninja Gaiden in 2d. Monster Hunter meets Pokemon meets Devil May Cry / Assassin’s Creed.

Imagine wandering a massive world, exploring it’s sights and properties, waiting to encounter clues that will allow a hunt to begin. You and your companions prepare for battle, or for further investigation. You travel to other lands for information on your prey, or acquire resources in-order to overcome it. You spend days living among its special relatives in it’s home land. You eventually become well-prepared and make the ascent to it’s home, carrying everything you own. You study the beast’s behaviour and mind, coming to grasp both it and its environment. You master any of your necessary skills. then in flashes of brilliance you bring pain to the animal. It comes closer to falling under your control. It doesn’t come easily, not at any point, and you must rely on much of your past experience to succeed. When you do succeed, your reward is great, and your journey becomes clear. You see what led you here and feel proud of your conquest. You bear the marks of your excursion, and travel on to find new ones, hopefully more challenging and sprawling than the one you have just completed..

There’s a great deal of technique in bringing a creature down. It’s massive, and I’m small and capable. I want to be technical, and brilliant, and on the tips of my toes. When it becomes cold I blaze bright hot, bringing love and justice to the world.

Ninjas are fast, and they’re agile, and they swing from the appendages of the world like it were a jungle gym. It’s a “toy” the ninja seems to say. “And I’ll play with it until I’m satisfied, and it’s substance is gone.” They fight monsters and baddies, and the boredom of solid routine. They are disciplined at being impulsive and elegant  And they slice up and through any obstacle and friend that greets them.

Assassin’s are ninjas with a darker style and firmer punctuation.

Go. AIs, puzzles, problems, tests, to bring a regular player to an expert, efficiently, effectively, and with balance. Animations, HUDs, sound effects, overlays, and commentary to expose the story behind a match to an inexperienced spectator.

First Implementation Cycle

Here’s a design I’m currently working on. It is in “stage 3” of implementation – the discussion of new ideas. My previous designs were theoretical discussions. This one is moving towards something that can be implemented.

It only focuses on “play,” of “play, express, share.” Later, when this design becomes a rock-solid design – one that can be implemented – then I’ll do matching ones for express and share. First we need the details. That’s what this is for.

I’ve have skipped posting large segments of other things, just because it would take too long to explain them.

* implementation goals

  What I need right now is to find some core to focus on. I want a
  playable idea. What is that goal?

    . some basic mechanics (a few)
    . a main character
    . a challenge curve
    . an atmosphere/world
    . a few controls
    . a few ways of thinking
    . more than 1 type of emotion conveyed through the mechanics.

* plan

  We don't need to go too deep. What we need is any mechanic for play.

  Then we need a way to create, and a way to share.

  Plan:
    1. get to 2nd level implementation for "play"
         -> example mechanics from games/
    2. then merge with express

  --

  I probably need to organize everything according to the actual tree.
  That would be dope.

* implementation (3rd round - new ideas)

  Hit the above pieces, for play.

  + some basic mechanics

    So play is kind of fucked. We need a mechanic for play. Something
    simple? How about running and jumping. Christ.

    The character has a small amount of momentum as he moves. There is
    only one speed of acceleration - no hold y down for speed.

    He can turn. He can run up slopes. He can do parcour. His jump is
    very weak. However, if he uses the terrain right, he can launch
    himself in the air and do crazy things.

  + main character

    The main character is a boy, of about 18. He is wiry. He runs fast,
    is acrobatic. He is kind of stylish, sticking his arms out for flair
    (and balance).

    His goal in life is to be reunited with his pet, dog-like creature,
    who is also ground-bound. The dog moves faster, can use bursts of
    speed, can get lower to the ground, can attack with his face, can't
    parcour as well, but can climb trees, can barrel roll, and do a
    couple more maneuvers.

  + challenge curve

    The challenge curve comes in the enemy types. You are being chased.
    You cannot fight back. You always lose a fight. The question is if
    you can stall enough to get into a position to escape.

    You have to backtrack across the map often. You master the area in
    order to escape.

    The terrain is not destructible. Your goal is

  + an atmosphere/world

    Something that connects with what we already have. Also, I could pick
    a few things off the top of my head.

    from before:
      1. being part of a military organization in space
      2. struggling for survivial in a harsh world
      3. learning to pursue brilliance

    That's not bad. Hunh.

  + a few controls

    I want the controls to reflect the experience of playing. They give
    the core sensation of what I have so far.

    He can only go left and right. Momentum is controlled entirely with
    timing, or is it? Maybe the player can hold down one button to make
    his guy duck, then release it to get a boost of something, maybe
    spped, or power, or jumping power if he jumps too.

    The idea is to think ahead a short bit, then prepare the correct
    momentum for it.

    There are loop-de-loops, ceiling wall-jumps, cork-screw jumps, slides,
    swings on poles, and so on. The player only controls jumping,
    momentum, and "ducking" - the storage of potential energy.

    He can't be reunited with his dog, because his dog is always on the
    run. His dog isn't crazy, but he wants to get away. No, he has to get
    away because he is taken away, by the forces of nature.

    The dog needs certain things in order to survive. The boy cannot
    provide these things, because it is beyond his power to do so. If he
    had more power - which he can get through the development of
    responsibility - then he can get his dog back.

    The dog shows up briefly for missions. When he is there, the
    cooperation between him and the boy is incredible.

    3 buttons:
      . analog: to speed up and slow down the boy. relative push/pull
        matters.
      . x button: jump. hold to jump higher.
      . a button: store potential energy.

    Potential energy is released automatically for certain moves. It can
    be poured into speed changes if the storage is released.

    It can also be used for jumps. Depletes slowly upon release, and
    quickly when being used for a move. Wall jumps, pole spins,
    loo-de-loops, all use of potential energy. Releasing the energy at the
    particularly right moment creates a burst in usage.

    There is a sweet spot in release. If the following move is used in the
    sweet spot then the energy release is far more powerful, and chains
    into more power storage if the storage button is held again.

    The goal is to build up enough potential energy to do something
    incredible. The more energy you get the more sweet your moves become.

  + a few ways of thinking

    I need a few different kinds of problems to solve. I have the timing
    of momentum. The player has to watch his dude's momentum, and try and
    find moments that he can best release the potential energy in.

    I want there to be some analysis of the opponent. There is of course
    the buddy stuff with the dog.

    There has to be a technical understanding of the map. We definitely
    want to master the map. So there is memory work, and understanding how
    best to use its strengths, how to avoid its weaknesses, or at least
    deal with them.

    I want there to be some mental math and prediction, estimation of how
    much energy will do what. There is a lot of timing, relative to
    enemies, and just in general. There is lots of projection of movement
    through space, affected by different jumping-off points and ricochets,
    and the type of position being jumped out of. Also speed and release
    of energy matter.

    There are basic tactical problems to solve, twitch maneuvering,
    momentum projections. Enemies have movement patterns. There is a sense
    of strategic position. There is projectile avoidance, the avoidance of
    moving enemies with unique patterns.

    You cannot fight. All you can do is run and jump like crazy. Why can
    you not fight? Because you are always afraid? That doesn't make any
    sense.

    The point is just to get to the dog.

  + more than 1 type of emotion conveyed through the mechanics

    Well, you have the fear. You also have some other things.

    There is the idea of something coming to get you. You can only
    run. You also build up energy. So you are always preparing. You also
    have the idea of slow mastery, moving very close to your target but
    not quite finishing him off.
      -> CREEPING FEAR

    There is a sense of balance to the character. He has his own
    personality, that shifts over time. The player's goal is to understand
    these shifts, then compensate by projecting correctly into the future,
    and adjusting his path and potential energy storage patterns
    accordingly.
      . absorption in the level, the character
      . understanding how the boy feels, being responsive to him, caring
      . you study him. you love him.
      -> SUPPORT

    There is the closely zero-ing on perfection, like amstering Forza. You
    take each turn more closely, and more closely. You want to shave off
    seconds from a lap time. You feel fear. You also feel in the zone. You
    want your intuition to merge with what is in front of you. You want
    inner peace. You want to get in the zone.
      -> FOCUS

    You feel like you are in a jungle gym, outsmarting the enemy. You feel
    free. You feel competent. You feel clever. You feel precise. You get
    in the groove. You feel like a dancer, one who reads the winds. You
    are like a flyer. You are a gymnast, dexterous, powerful, moving with
    finesse.
      -> FINESSE

    Then there are the puzzles. You get to be clever, then execute a
    solution in a flash, or carefully. That's giving him one right in the
    gut, then the face, then again the face, knocking him straight to the
    ground, firmly, snugly. The battle ends.
      . clever, power
      -> CLEVER

    There is a sense of power through slow study, through biding your time
    and preparing, then launching at once. Build, then release. That is a
    major theme of the whole game. Like Ippo, you train hard for the one
    moment in the ring, when you are put to the test, and get to let your
    emotions fly out.
      -> DOMINANCE THROUGH PATIENCE

some design notes

For the record and my own mental health….

I originally planned to do a single, small, design, that was the result of condensing all of my notes up until this point, into a simple-to-implement plan. The work that I have done in pursuit of this is complicated, and goes beyond the “simplicity” I originally had in mind. As a result the work is complex to explain, and I feel would be better understood if I revealed a prototype then worked backwards to explain how I got there.

I want to post something in lieu of the design. It is a cutout of my design work. Later on I’ll contextualize it.

This stuff is not for the faint of heart. It is meaty and technical, and long.

                 
Table of Contents
=================
1 implementation mirror level 2
    1.1 deep implementation
        1.1.1 howto
        1.1.2 first expansion
    1.2 fast implementation
        1.2.1 intro
        1.2.2 expression
        1.2.3 share

1 implementation mirror level 2
================================

1.1 deep implementation
------------------------

1.1.1 howto
~~~~~~~~~~~~
* intro

  Create a design. Do this by creating a mirror. Do an expansion for
  the 3 categories.

  How many subdivisions can I make?

  For now just do a single expansion at 3 levels deep. So 9 expansions.

  Process the expansions. Maybe repeat the process for additional
  mirrors until an implementation is found.

* steps

  1. I start with some suggestion, as a write up. I probably go for
     breadth first by citing a lot of resources as starting points.

  2. Then I do some expansion on any of those ideas that seem rich for
     mining.

  3. Then I process like normal.

  4. I may have to do several mirrors before I have something I can implement.

1.1.2 first expansion
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
* play
  + dimension: ROI cycle size

    How long it takes for a player to be rewarded for his or her
    investement of time, energy, effort etc. Obviously games reward at
    many sized intervals simultaneously but they tend to focus more
    towards one set of sizes than others.

  + short (ROI cycle size) - discussion
    - opening
      * intro
        Short sizes comprise largely action games. These games are
        characterized by fast pace, tight controls, a lot of failure, high
        scores, competitive multiplayer, yelling, anger, tension, etc.
        "Arcade" games are normally in this bracket.

        First I need to discuss possible designs.

      * 5 random games
        Could start with 5 random games that exemplify this category.
        Could actually tag these games somewhere. I would not mind having an
        official "game" file that lists all of the games in total.

      * games link out to other files
        Each game can link out to other files. It also stores tags that we
        assign. For example this dimension will need tags that we use to
        describe the games.

      * general
        I could also write a little about each game. I could also start
        designing something off the top of my head. I can also pull from some
        key words from above and from the original expansions and division
        discussions.

    - periods of high tension and luck
      * pacman is like poker: luck is involved
        Action games are exemplified by their difficulty. Challenge is their
        main attraction. Take PacMan. You move around the screen and avoid the
        ghosts. You try to outwit them. Though what's interesting is that the
        rewards are kind of abstract because you're not really sure if a death
        is because of a choice you made or just bad luck. Like poker, Pac-Man
        is very shifty in the results it gives. You never quite know where you
        stand with it.

      * gambler's rush
        Gambling is an interesting idea because gambling is very short-term
        focused. You get the "gambler's" rush. Pac-Man has this. But it also
        gives rewards for your strategy in the long-term. You don't really
        know how good your decisions were until after many playthroughs,
        giving the ROI for strategy a middle-size scale.

      * super small ROI cycle
        Pac-Man is also partially short-term when you get into close-quarters
        with the ghosts, or when you chase them all of a sudden. Yum yum.
        There's also of course the route planning

    - action mechanics
      * action games
        Super Mario World. My main attraction. Some more:
          . Donkey Kong Country, Contra, Gunstar Heroes, TMNT: Turtles in Time
          . Street Fighter, Smash Bros (sortof), Starcraft, HL2, Quake, UT

      * bosses use small cycles
        Adrenaline can't be the only kind of rush. Note that many games use
        short ROI cycles for their bosses. Interesting. Not a good decision
        as a given.

      * more examples
        Geometry Wars for sure. A lot of hand-eye coordination. Racing games,
        any shooter. Halo. Any platformer. Sonic.

    - balance action with reflection
      * player needs time to reflect
        The problem with purely short ROI cycle games is that they get tiring.
        They become this big mess. The player needs time to reflect, to link
        each of his ideas to his soul. That is a hard thing to do when you are
        always "on." RPGs accomplish this by blending combat with story. Zelda
        does it with the overworld mixed with dungeons. I bet a lot of great
        games do something similar.

      * super metroid
        Super Metroid? Short, tiny bursts of ROI, followed by monotonous
        back-tracking. Ugh.

    - control player with cycle size
      * tetris rewards with tight cycles
        Tetris actually ramps up the cycle slowly. In fact when you are doing
        well in tetris the cycle shortens for a short period. It actually gets
        longer when you are losing, but gets faster the longer you last. So it
        constantly re-enforces success with adrenaline.

      * ROI cycle-size management
        Maybe ROI cycle-size management is the most important.

  + implementation: 1st round - implementation details
    - opening, example games
      Goal: discuss basic implementation details

      I think this is enough. The next thing to do is list possible
      mechanics to deliver.

      We want mechanics that have a short reward cycle. Possible ideas:
        . platforming
        . wall jumping
        . combat

      3 types:
        . fighting/action: Street Fighter, Power Stone, Smash Bros / Contra,
        Geometry Wars, TMNT, Starcraft, Devil May Cry
        . platforming/racing: Prince of Persia, SMB3, SMW, SM64, DKC, N+ / Mario
        Kart 64, Forza 3, Hydro Thunder
        . shooters: HL2, UT, Doom, Counter Strike, Time Splitters 2, MW2,
        Halo 3/4

      Dimension: mechanic type:
        . fighting/action - combat
        . platforming/racing - control
        . shooters - control + combat

      These represent my favourite 3 genre types. I can still scour for
      other games in my notes.

    - brainstorm mechanics

      If I had only 1 action quality to have in my game what would it be? (brainstorm)
        . parcour
        . wall jumps
        . mastery of opponent
        . slowly approaching perfection - racers
        . keeping tack of many things on screen at once
        . crowd control
        . route planning
        . basic navigation
        . environmental usage
        . complex combo maneuvers
        . maintaining character momentum
        . balance of pace

      The most important part of action is the sweat. You fucking sweat
      buckets. You have to try and fail and fail and fail, and then you
      still fail. But then you succeed, then shortly after fail.

      You don't have a lot of time to think ahead. You have to react
      quickly. You have to rely on your instincts. You have to go to a
      place where your emotions take over and your consciousness just
      focuses on self-control.

      I also like speed a destruction.

    - brainstorm atmosphere

      Those cover the mechanics. Next we need atmosphere.
        . crazy, silly, funny
        . impulsive, ridiculous
        . explosions, combat, conflict
        . war, strife, struggle, pain
        . high pressure situations: nijas, surgeons, baseball player in
        "the big game"
        . dance music, clubs, fast women, drugs, alcohol
        . the arcade, friends, yelling, sweat, eyes glued to the screen,
        lots of noise, greesy hands and potato chips
        . adrenaline

      Sound:
        . could calm you. excellent balance.

    - review
      We have a good overview of the kinds of mechanics that deliver an
      experience. We even got a division for free. I got that one just by
      thinking.

  + implementation: 2nd round - 3 core mechanics
    - overview
      * process
        Look for details. Produce a list of 3 core mechanics to try and
        implement.

        I can:
          . list the main mechanic for random games in my list
          . try and describe some mechanics from base

        I want to avoid just copying games. Short cycle size means you get
        rewarded for an investment early on. The best reward is for something
        complex that uses as much of your skill set as possible.

      * discussion

        You need to get the player to invest. When you race you slowly get
        into the car's mechanics. You learn all of its edges, how the other
        drivers move, how the track works. You slowly master yourself by
        linking to each section of the race emotionally, then sorting out all
        of those feelings into a perfect run.

        The player needs time to get invested. In Tetris you have time to
        think things through then execute. The main problem with tetris is
        the straight-up challenge curve - it goes straight up. WTF! That's
        not good, fucking tetris.

        Gunstar throws increasingly challenging situations at you, though at
        least it's difficulty fluctuates a little. It is punctuated with
        bosses. Action games are often defined by their challenge curves - I
        mean pure action here. That's where their variety comes from.

        You have combos of course and their execution. You have reading the
        opponent's movement trying to detect a pattern. You have the analysis
        of strategy and position. When you are X-units away from the opponent
        and he is just coming out of move Y what are his weaknesses given his
        character? What is the best general strategy?

        Starcraft and Fighters both rely on a long-term investment in the
        study of technique and strategy. Then in-game the player must recall
        their old observations. When you play you aren't just reacting you
        are organizing all those thoughts you had before.

        Some of my favourite action segments come in FF battles - turn-based
        JRPGs. I love that shit. Extra Credits (EC) says turn based battles
        are boring. GTFY EC. Be better at combat and don't grind. Tards....
        You build up your party over the course of the game. Then you equip
        for battle. Then you fight, playing out your strategy and figuring
        out your new one - for the next try and this battle or the next.

        Zelda has a lot of adventuring/exploring elements mixed with combat.
        It mixes enemies well. Spelunky does this well. Devil May Cry does
        not but it gives you variety in its combos. You can always play a
        battle a little bit differently and get into unique scenarios on your
        own.

        In Bayonetta the main action is measuring opponent positions, looking
        for their attack signals, and choosing the biggest attack on the most
        exploitable enemy you can get away with. You dodge at the right time.
        There is a small sense of combo control. You need to get your own
        timings down, but the logic behind that is linear. Either you move
        forward with your combo or you don't. There is only a few types of
        combos to choose from - air/ground, power/fast, long-distance/short,
        single/multiple enemy. Even then most of the differences are small.

        There is a single best way to play a level. Watching speed runs you
        see guys playing a very linear kind of experience. Not the sort of
        thing I want. Though I love that shit in racing.... What is the
        difference? In racing every inch counts for something. In action
        games you either hit or miss. There is no place in between. You hit
        the drop of water out of the air or you don't. So you miss 20% of the
        time until you hit it. There's no variety between a 30% run, a 40%
        run and so on.

        A lot of games converge in their offered experience as a player
        masters them. Not cool.

        That's good enough for now.

    - shooters
      * discussion
        I can pick a mechanic from each section but since I'm feeling limber
        I'll do 3 from each. Start with shooters.

        What are the different kinds of skill sets used in shooters? In
        Bioshock we have the adventure/shooting combo. I don't like the
        shooting in that game a whole lot. You have the gimmicky moments when
        you need to shoot a lighting bolt into water for a mild advantage.
        You can take over turrets. Basically it's like any other shooter with
        a "do special action" button opportunity every so often.

        Counter Strike rules. It is like a racer except the track morphs
        slightly every time. The map is always the same - until the map
        cycles - but you run around it differently, with different guns, with
        different opponents.

        In CS - which I'm mediocre at - you have to project enemy movements.
        You have to stay hidden - your position has to be unknown. You want
        to head the enemy off. You want to get shots that suit your gun. You
        want to aim and press the trigger. You want to time your reloads. You
        want to find your way around the map properly. You want to know where
        all the best spots to be are, where you get the best sightlines. You
        always want to be on the move.

        A lot of the game is having good spatial awareness and acting in a
        way that is surprising. When an enemy comes around the corner you
        have to fucking shoot him. That can be difficult. Can you move and
        shoot? Where should you aim depending on your gun? How much time has
        the enemy has to prepare? A lot of CS is just getting the element of
        surprise. If you can take away an enemy's knowledge of what you are
        doing you get a huge edge, which then just multiplies.

        MW2 is brilliant in a lot of ways. There is a map with enemies
        running around it. If you get pinned down they learn where you are
        and it is harder to escape. You need to kill the most vulnerable
        guys. You don't want to leave yourself in the open for too long. You
        want to move. You have the scope in-and-out mechanic. You have
        grenades, a pistol, and the occasional weapon change. There is some
        strategy in choosing the right gun for the situation. Halo has a lot
        of this. Though Halo just also using every gun because of the lack of
        ammo. Or maybe I just suck at Halo....

        Half-Life throws the environment in. It does a much better job than
        Bioshock at this. Positioning of enemies is less important than it is
        in Counter Strike because you can walk and shoot all of them if you
        really want to. The enemy having the drop on you is less deadly in
        HL2.

        What I like about Half-Life is that it gives you unique environments
        to run around in. They always change the powers of the enemies, what
        the ground is like to move on, how big the corridors are, how well
        you can see. It changes the environment then forces you to think on
        the fly. The enemies use basic tactics.

        Rainbow Six is a lot slower. You can't react as quickly. You need to
        think ahead. You need to choose your cover wisely. You need to scope
        the enemies. You really need to remember where they are. You have to
        make decisions quickly. You have to pop in and out of cover. That
        sort of thing is getting tired thanks to Gears and Uncharted - I
        haven't even played Uncharted.

        3 types:
          . tactical shooter: Half-Life, Rainbow Six, Gears of War, Mass Effect
              -> reacting to the environment, uniqueness of situation
          . perfection shooter: Quake, UT, CS
              -> mastering maps, guns, opponents
          . arcade shooter: Halo, Return to Castle Wolfenstein, Time
          Splitters, Bioshock, Dead Space
              -> lots of movement and shooting

        That doesn't actually split us by mechanics though. These are the
        types of skill demanded by shooters:
          . map memory
              -> after seeing an area once, or a 1000 times.
          . strategic understanding of guns/equipment
              -> in what general ways should each piece of equipment be used?
              in what kinds of situations? against what type of enemies?
          . pointing and shooting
              -> this includes lead times, distance measurement, handling
              recoil, shooting bursts, aiming for the head - or body part
          . enemy pattern projection
              -> know how they think, where they'll go, how they'll react to
              each of your decisions
              -> know how they'll move given that you already know how they
              think. this is knowing how enemy AIs move before they know you
              are there.
              -> how much health does each enemy have?
          . tactical assessment
              -> considering all the enemies and what you have, what are the
              best places to go for cover? how long should you stay there?
              where should you move to next? account for sightlines, the
              chances of being pinned down, who you can shoot, and where you
              can move to after. who should you shoot next? when should you
              reload? what gun should you use? from where is it best used?
              what flank should you attack from?
          . movement
              -> basic platforming. go from point A to B quickly. sometimes
              you have to jump, climb ladders, thread your way through rough
              terrain.
              -> avoiding bullets. this is common in Halo. it includes
              avoiding rockets and other slow moving attacks.
          . judging sightlines
              -> what places can see what?
          . picking objects out
              -> see enemies, gun fire, cover, vehicles, and other
              mechanically relevant objects.
          . remember where static things are
              -> how long can you remember for? how accurately? under what
              kinds of pressure?
          . map "reading"
              -> given that you don't know/remember a piece of the map can
              you intuit which direction will lead you where? to health? to
              upstairs? to a flank?

        Note a major mistake. Horror goes a lot better with tactical
        shooting. Interesting! Why? Because horror is built with suspense.
        Constant action actually takes the mind off of horror. Notice how the
        Dead Space series has become more overtly action oriented over time?
        It has less horror and focuses more on the jump scare. It is still
        scary but less so. Why? Because the mechanics led them that way -
        also the money.

        Some major ways in which existing games don't "run with what they
        have":
          . Counter Strike doesn't teach players how to play
          . Bioshock is gimmicky. all the levels are aesthetically themed in
          a similar way. the adventuring aesthetics don't complement their
          own need to provide mechanical relevance. areas don't have a
          distinct "feel," not enough anyway.
          . Dead Space isn't tactical enough, relies too much on surprise,
          has too many corridors, doesn't use the limb cutting mechanic for
          tactical variety. shooting a leg is like shooting a head that moves
          in a different way. there's usually little tactical relevance to
          shooting one left over another, vs a head. always shoot the easiest
          leg to hit.
          . Halo requires too perfect of a way to play. watch someone on
          Legendary. they play in a very specific way. the game is also
          always on it relies on bullet sponges too much.
          . Gears is crazy with the bullet sponges. you don't move around
          enough. you usually have your head down.
          . Modern Warfare is actually pretty good. well so are these other
          games. MW has good tactical variety, different environments,
          characters. what it likes is a good push towards proper execution.
          that game is too easy to force your way through with a grind. there
          is always a lazy less interesting way to play.
          . Quake and UT are straight-up hard.
          . Half-Life doesn't have enough shooting. it relies too much on
          gimmick encounters and platforming, though both are very
          interesting. I would like to see more varied battles in and around
          their terrain.
          . Time Splitters enemies are basically all the same. robots are
          boring. blahhh.

      * review

        I've discussed the major shooters. Getting some pictures of each
        shooter could help a ton. Then I could sort through them somehow,
        watch a slideshow and just take notes.

        I have the basic mechanics. Shooters are about aiming and shooting
        and platforming and tactical analysis. They are very much about the
        mouse. They use the keyboard well. They take advantage of the
        high-detail ability of a computer monitor. They also exploit the
        ultra precise mouse. Not only that, the mouse can switch between
        precise and broad movements easily - gamepad analogs cannot do this -
        and shooters exploit that too.

        Are shooters better on the PC? Yes, they are. Get used to it. But
        console shooters have a serious advantage. They let you sit on the
        couch as more accessible. Console shooters are more like
        action-shooters. They have less to do with the actual shooting and
        often make up for it with other things.

        But then you have Goldeneye and that game ruled. Lots of people play
        Modern Warfare online, Battlefield. They care more about movement and
        trash talking. Goldeneye ruled because it was with your friends
        beside you. That`s a lot harder of a thing to setup with computers.
        Go LANs!

        I`ve got the major skills used. I might have to look into some level
        design soon. It will be super cool when I have all of my coming
        analysis in my head while playing through some awesome games. Then
        I`ll be able to soak up all that level design.

        Note. The most important part of shooting - the most characteristic
        part - is the shooting. You kill a guy by pointing the mouse. You
        also have to worry about your position. That`s shooting.

        Move in all 3 dimensions. Have different kinds of terrain. Have maps
        the player masters and learns. Have new opponents and familiar ones.
        Have a wide selection of guns to load out with, then another
        selection to have access to on the fly. Have abilities and grenades.
        Have levels. Have XP. Have different looking environments, different
        enemies with different skills, abilities and equipment. Have
        differently shaped areas, monsters, lighting and sound.

        Have different movement patterns for enemies, different sizes. Have
        an element of surprise. Allow tactical variety in a situation. Make
        sure the player is always doing something different. Teach him the
        basic skills. Control for ROI cycle size. Make some of it dynamic
        based on success.

      * next

        I need to group the mechanic types into 3 groups. Then I need some
        example levels that demonstrate the breadth of each type. Then I can
        review these levels based on memory of others games, maybe
        referencing some pictures and videos.

        Then I`ll probably pop up to long cycle sizes, or maybe not. I may
        also consider the atmosphere. I want the player to have a purpose.

        What kinds of emotions lend themselves to shootersÉ Since you are
        moving and shooting you are in 1st or 3rd person. That`s an important
        part of shooters. Being zoomed out creates an action game. So you
        want games that focus less on abstract feelings. You want your
        enemies to be like people, or at least the things we encounter in
        life. I don`t know what that means.

1.2 fast implementation
------------------------

1.2.1 intro
~~~~~~~~~~~~

What I want is a cycle around the 3 core: play, express, share. If I
have that it will be easier.

The player plays anything. Then he expresses.

For play lets just take Mario. Assume the player is playing Mario.

1.2.2 expression
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
* implicit expression

  How can we express? Two kinds:
    . implicit
    . explicit

  Implicit expression happens during normal play. While a player is
  playing Mario he is making a statement about himself. He is being
  cautious, aggressive, emotional, inconsistent, fancy, optimal,
  skillful, all in various contexts. Implicit expression is this. It is
  everything that is true about the connection between a player's state
  and what he inputs into the game.

  What are the things that he "says?" What are all the major emotions
  that a player goes through? What are his thoughts? Accomplishments?
  How best is his experience recorded and represented?

  3 kinds of representation:
    . changing character
    . changing world
    . changing NPCs

  + character

    For example, Mario could reflect the player's style by becoming
    naturally influenced by it. If a player is more aggressive maybe
    Mario becomes more naturally aggressive. He starts to take on an
    aggressive tone.

    This kind of reflection is like a mirror. There is little distortion
    or analysis. If the player does X the mirror reflects X, though with
    reduced power. I think a lot of aggression results in a little
    permanent aggression.

    How long does the impact last? If I'm aggressive for 2 minutes does
    that create a temporary effect? Maybe there is a "level average." So
    as I play the level, my character reflects how I've been playing that
    level. So by the end of the level I am level-2 angry and level-3
    silly. The values partially reset for the next level.

    Maybe at major moments in the level my state changes. Check-points
    create a window to reset my momentum. Maybe for 30 seconds my actions
    have triple the weight.

    There's also distorted reflections. In Fable you get scars for being
    evil. What if the character becomes stronger if he uses one move a
    lot, or maybe he becomes weaker with it. Maybe he can develop an
    addiction to something.

  + world

    The character reflects an average of what the player has done. It can
    also reflect very particular decisions, such as customization,
    equipment loadout, and battle scars. That last one is an indirect
    result of a decision. The world however reflects events, and even
    more particular decisions.

    I can show craters from battles, or constructions made as a
    representation of how the player thought about the world. The world
    can be segmented geographically, representing a division of time -
    close places in the world are close places in the journey. The
    character reads like a summary and the world reads like a timeline.

  + NPCs

    NPCs are kind of a combination of world and character. They are a
    summary of the player's actions, but often individually focused on
    particular groupings of them. Your father will have different shared
    experiences with you than your mother, and not only that he will have
    a different perspective on the experiences he has shared with you.

    NPCs also mix in their own opinions. They are a mixture of a summary
    of their own pasts mixed with their perceptions of some of yours. When
    you interact with them you are seeig a comparison of your behaviour
    against other possible behaviours - theirs. You see yourself with
    perspective.

    This is why companions are so endearing. They make struggles appear to
    exist in a larger story, grounding them. Your struggles _do_ exist in
    a larger story, and NPCs make that clear.

  + summary

    Basically you pick the things you think a player might want to know
    about what he has done and create a way to show it to him. You want
    to highlight the interesting aspects of his journey, the ones that
    illustrate truth, and allow the player to reflect.

* explicit expression

  Explicit expression is more complex to talk about. Explicit expression
  is the player turning around to do something awesome based on the
  inspiration he has received from playing. Some examples:
    . outfitting your party in a turn-based RPG, buying stuff in town,
    making levelling decisions. this is based on experience in battle.
    . building stuff in Minecraft. This is you just expressing your
    ideal aesthetic, and some functional analysis of how best to live
    in the world.
    . editing a level in Little Big Planet. You have an idea of what
    would be fun and try to express that. You want to use your insight
    from playing in a way that makes them more, clarifies their value,
    and allows you to build onthem.

  Pretty much anytime a player does anything in a game he is learning
  about that game's world and mechanics. He is thinking about them. When
  he is given a chance to express himself he can express any of those
  thoughts that he had.

  The player can take anything he has learned and build on it. If he is
  playing Mario he has insight into the following:
    . jumping mechanics. the best way to jump in every context. how
    each jumping pattern makes him feel. how each level design produces
    a jumping pattern.
    . how the aesthetics make him feel.
    . how NPC patterns affect the challenge and how he feels.
    . what challenges give him the most trouble, the most frustration,
    how to deal with these feelings in order to improve.

  He gets insight into how each aspect of the design affects his
  experience; how he reacts to each scenario; how he develops over a
  session, or multiple; how he needs to think in order to improve or
  reach his goals; what he actually needs to do in-game in order to
  succeed. When we design we think about the player. We think about how
  he will think at each moment, how he will think over time, and what
  he will do.

  Our goal is to create the best experience for him. His goal is to
  study his own experience so that he can play better, so he can learn
  what kind of mental state gives him absorption, what kind of design
  gives him that mental state, and what kind of design gives others
  that mental state.

  What I want is for a player to turn around after a session and do 3
  things:

    1. Analyze what he did do so that next when he does it he can
       improve his absorption.
         - this is playing new situations better, like a new level of
           Mario, or an old level with 0 memory about its structure.

    2. Analyze the situation based on what he learned so that he can
       apply his observations towards improvement in-game.
         - this is playing old situations better, like replaying a level
           for the 10th time and applying a strategy, or outfitting your
           party and equipment setup for fighting the boss for the
           second time.

    3. Create a new structure to play through/with that will be
       interesting in its own way, based on observations just made.
         - this is building something in Minecraft. It is creating a
           level in LBP. It is making a decision to head north towards
           Narshe - instead of somewhere else - for your own engagement
           only (not to reach a game-defined goal). You have made a
           level design experience that affects only you.

  Obviously the goal is to ramp up to creating level design for others
  to become engaged in.

* examples
  What are some specific things a player would create in Mario?

  So lets say that Mario changes to reflect the player's style. The
  most important thing would be... the degree of playfulness. Anytime
  the player does something that doesn't help him reach his goals
  that is considered playfulness.

  If I import your Mario into my world I get the degree of playfulness
  with it. Maybe playfulness is also based on the situation. So there
  is a greater degree of playfulness for certain themes, around certain
  enemies. Maybe there are certain patterns of playfulness development.

  Maybe I should look at what I wrote and try to come up with some
  specific examples. This is going to be difficult.

  What I really want to do is "empty the player's tank, of creativity."
  When a player plays he fills up with ideas. The idea is to give him
  an outlet, and give him a way to record what he has already
  expressed, implicitly.

  The player alternates between filling up and expressing. If he can
  express interesting things, things that engage him, then we let him
  continue to express. If he cannot express interesting things then we
  put him back to work, playing the game. He cycles between playing and
  expressing.

  We also want to record everything that he does. If he is 20%
  aggressive, 20% better than before, 20% acute, then we want to show
  that somehow. 3 levels: lifetime, level, encounter. We want averages
  for each, reflected through the character's behaviour. We want 3 main
  gauges of what the player is doing.

  There are also 3 kinds of contexts at each level, 3 encounter types,
  3 level types, and only 1 game type. One context might be "enemies
  that require finesse," or "enemies that require spatial reasoning,"
  or "levels that are suddenly more challenging than the ones
  previous." Really I'm looking for context divisions that produce the
  widest variety in player responses.

  Then we have NPC reactions. We have global opinion, opinion by
  character type/location, and opinion by individual. Opinions are a
  mixture of perception of player behaviour and personal past.

  The world reflects particular decisions. 3 categories:
  success/failure, style, exploration.

  + searching for 3 dimensions

    Aside. What are the 3 main dimensions a player's experiences varies
    by? Challenge is one, obviously. We also want story-like decisions.
    So the player has to make strong decisions about how he wants his
    character to develop. He makes personal decisions to do this. Then we
    have strategic decisions. The player makes commitments to particular
    kinds of strategies.

    The problem is, we want to measure things the player would already do
    in Mario, so I can't do the above 3. Challenge is okay. What else
    does the player express in Mario? Maybe 3 different types of success?
    For different kinds of moves? What about relative success, like
    improvement? We also have fluent success, hot streaks, how many tries
    passing a single challenge took. We have types of failures, what
    enemies killed the player, in what way, what the player was trying to
    do before hand.

    Style is one dimension. How stylishly a player beats a section. Does
    he value style over optimization? Style is when he does cool things
    that aren't necessary. Style occurs only when the player does
    something challenging. Then we have exploration. Exploration is when
    the player takes his time to figure something out, to learn or study.
    He studies an enemy's behaviour, how best to beat it, how the
    mechanics of a level segment work, how a power works.

  + reflecting the player's decisions

    What I want is a world the reflect's the player's decisions. There
    will have to be many elements that the player revisits. There will
    have to be a home, then paths that lead out to other worlds. Then
    there will be a second home and so on.

    The player branches out. The world is a living record of his
    adventures. He gets powers and items and equipment and partners to
    help mark his progress.

    I need to figure out the major moments in an experience and reward a
    player for all of them. Possibilities:
      . completion of a quest (several levels)
         - includes segments punctuated by a boss
         - and side quests gone on voluntarily
         (Minecraft gives special ores, which then can be used for new
         things)
      . completion of a quest chain. possible rewards:
         - perishable items - for use in battle, construction of buildings
         - NPC attitude changes, new partners, their willingness to do
           things for you, give things to you
         - new equipment (semi permanent), new powers (permanent)
         - new aesthetics, achievements, trophies. these things just look
           cool. high scores count here. you can get a new banner or cool
           looking sign for your home.
             - think the M that goes on Jinx's dojo (when you beat him for
               the 3rd time).

  + explicit expression

    What are the things that the player would want to express explicitly
    in Mario? This is all level design. Think about the things a player
    has to think about while playing but doesn't have the chance to
    express naturally.

    You know it would be really great if everything the player did
    actually mattered in-game, in proportion to to its value to the
    player while doing it. For example, in Mario my stylishness has no
    effect on anyone. I can collect bonus coins and get nothing, free
    lives, that's it. A free life only matters when you're low, when you
    suck, or when you haven't figured out that they don't matter yet.
    Your lives reset when you turn the game off anyway. How crap is that?

    Yoshi coins are garbage too. If I do a stylish kill and die stupidly
    where does my style go? In soccer at least my teammates see; that
    counts for something. But in Mario I gain nothing. Everything is
    gone. I don't want it to be gone. I want it to stay. When I do
    something optimally I save time. When I do something well I get to
    progress. When I avoid damage while holding a power I get to carry it
    forward. But when I use style? I get nothing. Isn't Mario about
    exploration? Isn't it about having fun? Then why do the mechanics not
    support that? Why do they conflict with the obvious aesthetics, the
    ones that try to encourage you to be impulsive, to do whatever you
    want, the ones that are everywhere?

    In Mario 64 at least they have the Stars. The stars were an invention
    to give points for style. Some stars require style and some do not.
    The player can go for the ones that he likes. The problem with the
    stars of course is their reptitiveness - you're always playing the
    same level - and the unecessary freedom given to the player. Not
    balancing challenge with fun is too easy in that game. There should
    be more structure in the order you have to go for the stars. Of
    course this structure should be intertwined with the story, and
    environment.

    I can tell an incredible story if I can just get the player to
    invest. Hmmm....

  + building things - what the player knows

    The player wants to create levels that actually do something for him.
    He wants to create levels that build on his knowledge. What does a
    player know after playing Mario? Let's start with the Prince of
    Persia, because that's what I've been playing.

    I run around on walls. I have to map out an area in my mind. I have
    to figure out where to go. There are a lot of mental dead ends. I am
    often working with a difficult camera. The level design in that game
    is actually pretty good. Lets start witht he basics:
      . aiming/timing jumps
          - getting the wall run start going properly. requires aim that
            is partially relative to the camera, and timing for the R1 -
            something Assassin's Creed does not demand.
          - timing the wall run with saws
          - jumping out of the wall run at the right moment
              - to hit another object from various camera angles
              - to hit various objects: poles, ledges, platforms
              - based on: memory, visible position, shadow, other
                relative markings (such as on the wall)
              - to go as far as you can
              - to get the fastest run, when on a clock
          - same but with vertical wall runs
          - wall jumping in time
          - jumping from swinging pole, on first try or next
          - similar to wall run jump positioning but with ledges
          - jumping gaps. has some variety as wall run jumps but with the
            adding difficulty of opening angle
       . gauging distances:
          - for wall run lengths: horizontal, vertical
          - for jump lengths
       . fighting
          - enemy attack signals
          - enemy attack pattern projection - which attack will they pick
            next
          - assessing position, not getting cornered, choosing most
            vulnerable enemy
          - attack maximum amount with getting damaged
          - rewinding on the most damaging attacks
          - blocking at the right time
          - choosing the right attack: jump, attack, move-attack, dagger,
            draw, guard; special: wall bounce
          - combining the above together
          - protecting Farah, tracking her health
          - crowd management: stunning some enemies, daggering for a
            reprieve, clearing space around a downed enemy
        . figuring out a puzzle
          - finding objects that can be platformed on
          - noticing special objects: doors, buttons, weapons, crates,
            cracks, "gateways" (entries/exits), enemies, sand clouds,
            turn-styles, pull levers - vertical/horizontal
          - running pathfinding through your head
          - deducing options, general strategy
          - getting into better positions to see what to do
          - following your intuition
          - replaying the puzzle in your head to think where you missed
            something
          - keeping track of everything in your head
          - keeping your sense of direction even while moving through the
            level
          - combining all of these with various action challenges
          - general logic: with the mirror puzzle, the "weapon system"
            puzzle
          - exploring, by looking for everything, following leads etc.
        . weapon timings
          - getting the rhythm - like "when to go" when several saws are
            at work, several mocing pieces combined with spikes etc.
          - executing properly, including roll timings etc

    The player basically needs to think about the relationship between
    the level and how it makes him feel. What frustrates him? Give him
    the most challenge? The most pleasure? The most confusion? What are
    the optimal strategies for beating it? etc.

    How can constructions be tested?

    The player also knows about the world. If there are any patterns that
    link the environment to the mechanics/design he will pick up on that.
    He will also know how he feels. If the level produces a lot of horror
    then he will feel what? The desire to express his fear? Or his wish
    for safety, and what that looks like?

    The player should be expressing the top feelings that the game gives
    right?

  + building things - what the player can build

    I've already covered Prince of Persia. Next comes Mario. What does
    the player know in Mario?
      . enemy behaviours, how best to deal with them
      . how to deal with a variety of problems
      . how each situation makes him feel
      . how he feels, in accordance to what the game is designed to make
      him feel - important to get this right

    Spike sideways. Assume The Impossible Game. The player can only do 1
    thing. He can jump. That's it. We can choose when to jump. He wants
    to get as far as possible. Either he makes a jump or he misses it.
    What does the player learn while playing? He learns:
      . what situations give him the most trouble
      . which patterns are the most interesting
      . how best to control his thoughts in order to succeed

    He can build:
      . interesting jumps
      . jumps that will help practice his skills
      . easy/hard jumps that give a good challenge curve or pacing

    In other words what are the kinds of things a player could build that
    would make him an optimal player? If he can learn to build these
    things he will naturally become a better player. He wants to explore
    all of the mechanics available to him. Ideally he can do this with
    the level design mechanics that already exist.

    He also wants to build things that are interesting. Maybe there are
    particular patterns of challenge, particular orders of interactions,
    things to do, that stimulate him. First he learns that pattern P gives
    engagement level L, then he learns pattern P2 gives him engagement
    _type_ T - like an emotion or something, some mental state. Then he
    learns what patterns of engagement types maximize his engagement, and
    create new types of engagement. Then he learns how to give successful
    engagements to others.

1.2.3 share
~~~~~~~~~~~~

* intro discussion

  The whole point of expressing is that you can share what you have. You
  want to show people what you went through, so that you can learn more
  from it. You want to create for others. Most importantly you want to
  develop relationships, end up on a team, and create together. That is
  the point of this game, to get on a team and create something
  with them.

  There are a lot of ways to share what you have done. In Minecraft you
  just show the physical construction. What if players had a hub world
  to browse everyone's constructions from. There was some way to vote
  on which ones you like, which ones inspired you. Cool right?

  You can share strategies and high scores. You can share what you have
  earned. You can share the world around you. You can import your
  character into someone else's world. They can import it. What is
  imported acts in a natural way.

* dealing with specifics

  Given the Impossible Game mechanics, what are some things that the
  player would want to share? The player wants to share:
    . his current state - what he plays like now, how he relates to the
      game, what he is capable
    . his major events - big things that have happened to him,
      people/NPCs that he's won over.
    . his creations: that reflect who he is, how he sees the game, what
      he has created for others to consume

  Probably need some specific examples of things the player could
  create.

Share – Discussion

The post is part of a design process. You can see the process explained, along with other posts involved in the process, here.

World of Warcraft (WoW) lets you share the grind. You get instances, have a guild, see other people around. You are inspired to succeed to beat the next guy. You are also reminded of the existence of other human beings.

Part of the addiction of WoW comes from the need to outdo your peers. You want to be a part of something, and you don’t want to fall behind. So you play… maybe a little too much, maybe the right amount.

I haven’t played a lot of WoW, but I’ve known players, heard many people speak about it, known at least one addict. I played a game called Realm of Empires (ROE) for a month. It is a “social RTS” MMO. So think Farmville meets a simplified Civilization stuck in the middle ages – that’s the time period of the game’s setting, not a snide comment about its quality.

ROE I played because I was considering working for the company that makes it, because they are local and I didn’t mind the idea of money for a while. Anyway I didn’t take the job. Their game was addictive for a little while. Why? Because I had to learn its secrets in order to apply… or at least feel comfortably prepared in applying.

Turns out my prep. didn’t matter to them, but it mattered to me. I learned something about the social draws of games like these. They bring you in with a few mechanics, then keep you there by comparing you to other players. You don’t want to lose to them. You want to outdo them. Yes you can, because you are smart too, maybe even smarter than them.

The annoying part comes when the game becomes about the grind and not about your skill. This is the place all games want to avoid, and never do because it’s impossible. You make a social game better by making competition about the players, not about the skill, and not about the time.

Not about the skill? Does that surprise you? The enjoyment of a game should not depend on your skill. … think about it. Skill takes practice. Practice is a grind, whether enjoyable or not. Competition should be available to all players no matter how good they are.

Engagement comes from the acquisition of skill and the comparison of skill. So skill has to matter somehow. I want to play you because you are good and I am good. I want to get better and I want to beat you. Both of these desires are based around skill.

---

Sports let you play on a team, or watch a team with a team (your friends, other spectators). I wasn’t very good at sports when I was younger. Now I am mediocre. Sometimes I was okay, particularly playing pickup games, like of basketball, but never in front of an audience, in a competition, “on the stage.”

I used to mountain bike a lot. There weren’t a lot of mountains near where I lived but there were lots of bike paths, marsh-type areas, hidden parks, hills, creeks and so on. I developed strong calves. Those and my back were the only semi-developed parts of my body.

My back came from horsing around in the yard, or at camp. We’d play tackle the guy with the football, often with older kids. I loved that game. That was something I was good at. We’d also just wrestle, into submission.

British bulldog: I first played that in grade 4 I think, with Bob Scott, a fellow fourth grader. He was tough, and we played with a bunch of kids, mostly younger than us, just due to circumstances. Really we’d walk across the field and the kids would tackle us. How many of them would it take? Took 1 to get me down at the beginning, then 2, then 3 then 4. He could take 5 and keep walking. He’d usually strut.

After cross country practice – as a junior in elementary school – we’d play manhunt with the team. Just kids, with 20 feet in the middle of a foot pile, one kid counting, “eenie meenie minie moe.”

I enjoyed that group because it was a guarantee, and there were some cool kids there. Since we ran cross country together, and came out for (lunch) recess later than everyone else, we played together. That was a given. No questions about who could join. The point of being on a team is to be guided by one another, to be self-conscious in the face of recognition.

I remember when I was very young my father took me to tykes soccer, indoor soccer. We’d play for a while then get donuts at the end. I loved the donuts.

I used to stare up at the ceiling, looking at the lights, imagining things. A few times I tried to kick the ball. I didn’t see the point. A mob of kids would follow the ball across the floor. The ball went 5 feet to the right, 10 kids went 5 feet to the right. The ball went 2 feet forward… you get the idea. I thought, “what’s the long term goal of this?” I couldn’t believe in it. Besides, the lights drew me in, into my imagination, inspired by the activity around me.

I like thinking while the people around me are doing things. I like being on a plane, or a bus, or a long car ride with friends. I like small spaces and intense silences. I like study hall. I like poker – competitive study hall.

Sports give a similar feeling, but you compete athletically in them, instead of academically or meditatively. You exist in a space with others, perceive their behavior and they perceive yours. The goal is irrelevant. A ball in a hoop, money in your pocket, a good time. You act with belief and you share. Everyone gets in the zone and learns.

LANs of course are worth mentioning. Diablo II lans rule. I played Counter Strike lans at one place of work at lunch. There were some good players there. Co-op shooters on the couch. So many hours playing Smash Bros with friends. Secret of Mana with a good friend as kids – he didn’t normally play games. Swapping a controller to beat a race in Ratchet and Clank – for bolts (money).

Intimacy is a shared experience, the pickup. Talking is shared. Facebook, twitter, the internet. Blog comments, blogs. You want to be heard and hear what other people have to say, because they have unique perspective, because they are in a different mental state from you and have lived different lives.

Joe and Mac with my father, once. He got pissed because I kept accidentally clubbing him – we could hurt each other (should have turned that one off – didn’t know how (I was an idiot)).

Board games with my family – card games, Cribbage, Risk. I loved board games, complicated board games. I wish they were deeper. Getting drunk with friends… other things like that. Singing while drunk. Arguing about science, school, politics, religion. Being in a lecture hall, listening to the professor, taking notes, with everyone around you doing something similar.

You want to compete with others; you want to do similar things around them, you want to do anything around them, so that you can learn from them, using them as an example; so that you can learn from them, using them as a reflection of yourself.

There is a feedback loop with other people, even if they’re ignoring you. You behave, you perceive, you reflect. Their experiences and opinions contrast against yours and you learn. You grow, or at the very least see inside yourself for a moment, achieve a state of levity or control.

Create – Discussion (part 2/2)

The post is part of a design process. You can see the process explained, along with other posts involved in the process, here.

---

This is part 2. See part 1 here.

Solving algorithms feels real good: devising them, figuring them out. “Here’s your problem Graham. No one else can do it, except the brilliant ones. That may not include you.” That’s what fires me up. I soak my head in the problem and wait. I become invested. I look inside myself, sort through my ideas using my instincts. I go down many paths, reach many dead-ends… always getting closer to the goal.

There are moments of elation. The rush: it feels so good. I am empowered for days after a good solution, often longer. I had been chasing a Poker AI for years. I wanted to see its connection to search technology for the web – smart search, comprehensive, based on a knowledge of you (the user).

I am creating in those experiences. Solutions, though brilliant, are often in a small set of correct ones. Implementation offers room for style but the real genius is in the observation that let you succeed. That part exists in a small space. There isn’t much room for variation there.

The variety comes in the path to get there. The process on the way to the solution: that’s where your personality shines. You share how you reasoned your way out, all the analogies you used. No matter how personal they get you always get the answer. You subvert the problem with your intuition, your life experience. That’s what makes the experience powerful. It is about you.

Create + Share

Playing Time Splitters 2 (TS2) with Coffey – my friend – in my basement back in high school, when I was 14, before and after: that was good. We got into the groove and talked all night. The game is a cooperative shooter. We’d discuss strategies, and basically insult each other, occasionally breaking out into a war (in-game) between us.

I remember one level that was insanely hard for us because it required stealth. We had to follow this woman without being seen, by her, cameras or the police. Shooting was rare – at least for the stealth part. We screwed that level up about 52 times.

I had a gun and he did not. His punch was stronger than mine though. We fought in the spawn area all the time. You follow the bitch, slip up then boom, level over. “Fuck. Fuck. Fuck you. Fucking, fucking, fuck you. You fucking fuck.” Oh yeah, being young. I’m not much different now.

I remember we finally beat that level, after hours – literally. And he said, “I better have a gun this time; I better have a fucking gun. Fuck I’d better have a gun.” <spawn>. <pause>. “I don’t have a gun…. I don’t have a gun! Fuck! AND I’M IN JAIL! FUCK! I DON’T HAVE A GUN AND I’M IN JAIL!” <laughter by me>. “Fuck. I’m in fucking jail. Fucking fuck. Fuck.” You get the idea…. He was in jail and I had to go save him. That was the first part of the level, every time we played it – :).

Strategy comes, but not in the way a lot of modern big budget developers would make you think they think it comes – that made sense. It doesn’t come from your decisions about how to approach a situation – though that does happen. It comes from how you relate to each other, your emotions, your perceptions of each other.

You play sloppy, they notice. You play like a tard? They notice. You become over-zealous, try to play the hero, become lazy, late, on-top, supporting, whatever… they notice, hopefully. Then they tell you, in their own personal way.

That’s where the strategy comes from. You watch him and he watches you, and you talk the whole time. The strategy comes in during your pursuit of the ideal play session. You think about it by relating to your friend/play-partner. You act, reflect, then adjust, based on an assessment of your performance, that is a mixture of your understanding of systems and how your friend perceives you.

Unreal Tournament (UT) on the Dreamcast: same thing. I even get in the zone with my sister sometimes, though always when she’s short 1 controller (when she’s not playing). She back-seat drives. “Go back… left, left.” Me: “what the fuck… this isn’t the way!” Her: “just go forward, yep… there, pick that up.” <get health>. “… thanks… I needed that.”

I found the correct path, the way out of my mental block, in Secret of Evermore thanks to my Mom. Same thing happened in FF6. I come to her with a question, she makes an obvious observation – based on her knowledge of me, and none of video games – and solves my problem, without even realizing it. That’s collaboration!

I play FF and my sister watches. I’m skilled in battle. Turn-based tactics, in-menu strategy are places that I shine. I can see the optimal path easily. I enjoy finding it. Then in battle I slowly ramp up to the ultimate execution.

If there’s a way to beat a boss without leveling I’ll do it, without treasure, with balls… and my sister watches. We get into a menu, make decisions, and when I fall apart she notices and says something. Or sometimes I just notice on my own, get back on track without any pushing. Being self-conscious without any direct influence: that’s the power of another person.

Create – Discussion (part 1/2)

The post is part of a design process. You can see the process explained, along with other posts involved in the process, here.

---

This is part 1. See part 2 here.

The point of producing is to find who you are. When we are doing things we will eventually become unengaged, because our instincts come into conflict with our actions. Either we self-analyze and fix our instincts or we change our activity.

Creating is a way to take control. We create things to remind ourselves of what we believe. More than that we do it so that we can find what we believe. When we don’t know what action to take next we have to express ourselves somewhere. We must express that which feels the most natural to us.

Life can be broken into two components. You act, then you reflect, so that you might find how to act next.

Placing blocks in Minecraft is taking your natural imagination and connecting with it… then studying it. The Skies of Arcadia crew-building “mini-game” is an expression of your ideal living environment, as well as your ideal in-game strategy. Through it you express how you feel about your future, your friends, your family, and the system you have been experimenting with and focusing on.

Some games with a flexible path to solution:

• Super Mario World
  

  You can kill an enemy, in several ways, or avoid him, in several ways. This combined with other enemies, and paths, and power-ups, gives many options available to a player. Also, there’s speed, risk, style, finesse, bravado and so on that the player can modulate.

• Prince of Persia
  

  Even though there is only one path to a solution, often, you can control how convincingly you platform it – how confident you are in the required steps to go through it – being rewarded with nothing but smooth momentum and engagement.

  You can also be extra cautious and think longer than you need to, explore, decide how to approach a puzzle before you know the solution – which paths to test out first, in what order. You get an intuitive impression of the layout of the room, at the beginning and at the end of each platforming segment, and react based on that. You choose where to focus your attention first, whether to “go for it” (or continue exploring), how confidently to go for it when you do, then repeat the process.

• Final Fantasy (FF) 13
  

  How to equip your party before a battle. The equipment setup in 13 is slow – blah – archaic, not flexible, not enough choices, not abstracted properly, very little party building – I can’t even remember interesting leveling choices. FF gets gimmicky.

  You get some control in the flow of battle however. You make a plan, then try to stick to it structurally, then adapt with it, taking advantage of each situation. You express yourself through the setup, and of course the party building – a little – then again in battle.

Legos with my Dad felt great – when I was 5 – because it was something we could share. “Now put this here,” he would say. I felt so good about that experience. It made me comfortable with life, with who I was. I felt like I was in control, like I wasn’t lost. A lot of powerful memories come back to me from thinking about this stuff.

I was creating by following instructions, but I was also making decisions. I had to remember where to look on the page, recycle my history – through my mind – to find the right place. I interpreted the instructions, lusted for the later steps, found the right lego piece, analyzed the physical structure, asked a question, received guidance. Minecraft captures a lot of this. Actually, it misses out on a fair bit too.

Working with Amanda (my sister) on my K’nex Big Ball Factory was a reduced version of what I did with my Dad. She provided less guidance, but it was still fun to interact with her, to share the process of building, to divide tasks.

Theater is interesting. There was a lot of power that came with being on stage, preparing to be on stage. I wanted back then to blow people away. I wanted to do a good job. I wanted to show what was inside of me.

What I liked the most about the theater – actually there were two things – was fitting in, and being able to prepare my presentation. I was always caught off guard in public situations, because I didn’t know how to relate how I felt without pissing people off. My relationship with my parents and our family’s inconsistency with our local society ensured this. Also, my stupidity hurt too.

In the theater I could prepare. I could plan and plan. I could ensure in my mind that whatever I was going to do would be acceptable. I had time to build up my own confidence. There are only 2 bad memories I have from my theater experiences – well, only two really bad ones. I didn’t get the Scarecrow part for Oz – she fucked me, the director – and I missed the auditions for Sears (drama competition) in grade 11. I wanted to be a part of a team. I also wanted to show my talents. I had been preparing for a real part my whole life.

I liked building the plants* for Little Shop of Horrors in Grade 11, because it used my technical knowledge. There was a lot of variety, people to surprise, respect to be earned. I could work with others, teach them what to do. I remember giving – what’s her name – the sexy girl with a fully body who went to Spain… control of Audrey 2. That felt good.
* The plants are these 4 successively larger puppets. The largest fits a person inside.

I got attention – Mr. Thorne ensured that – and I got to do something interesting. I also worked my way into acting the part of the plant, and made a friend in Khalil. We were too different, my family. Creating was my way to show what was special about me, how I stood out and why I was special. It was a way for me to fit in.

Dungeons and Dragons (DnD) was awesome with Chris – from university. We was such a good Dungeon Master (DM). We shared some good memories. I remember looking forward to DnD night, being able to rely on him to bring a good session. The experiences only helped our friendship.

I wished I played more DnD, and took it more seriously. I liked sharing creativity with my friends. I enjoyed that a lot. I made some friends that way. My campaign was terrible (the one I DMed). I learned a lesson there.

I remember after 2byte* hit me in the face, and knocked me down, I fantasized for about a year – holy shit – about running a new campaign for my old friends, to show off my new talents. I wanted them to be proud. I wanted to connect to them.
* 2byte was the nickname for my game development study group.

The desire to reach out to others was repeated. It showed up in high school with theatre, with my Dad when I was 5, then again with my friends in university. I expected to relate to my colleagues at Suited Media through my work, with my Dad and family now through the same thing.

My work will save me, because it will show everything that I know how to do. I have studied the presentation of ideas so that I might share what I know. I want to connect. I don’t want to be alienated anymore. This is what all nerds want. We want to be out there, be ourselves, and be strong. I want people to be honest with themselves. I want them to connect to others. I want them to follow my lead.

Goal: create a platform for others to express themselves through, so that they can experience the sensation of doing so, reflect on it themselves, then share it with everyone else. Tie people together, to themselves, to the rest of the world… through the web, through reality.

Play – Discussion

The post is part of a design process. You can see the process explained, along with other posts involved in the process, here.

This discussion is a little technical. The following 2 will be more conversational.

---

Playing is absorption in the game that I value the most, or that I believe that average person will value the most, that I can build.

I pay attention to metrics and my own intuition to create this game. All I care about is raising long-term engagement figures. Ugh. That’s ugly. There’s a lot of guess work involved.

Obviously playing involves other people, but we’ll save that for sharing.

What are the most absorbing games that I know of? Maybe it would be useful to list all of my games that I love…. Off the top of my head I have 3 categories: action, action/adventure, and rpg/strategy.

Those are technical divisions. Other divisions exist. For example…

• child, teens, adulthood
• games, other media, life

I have made the unofficial decision to focus on games, then build outward, because games are the easiest to be inspired from. They translate to other games the most smoothly. They are only 1 step removed from a potential prototype, instead of the 2 a movie would be – story line from movie –> story line for game –> story line for my game.

This restriction is a good one. I could also divide by aesthetics. Though standard genres are the most natural.

Aesthetics:

• action – fast paced, reflexes, high pressure
• action/adventure – mixture of action and exploration, planning, slower decision making
• rpg/strategy – mixture of action/adventure with long-term planning, deeper narratives

Qualities being manipulated:

• length of average play session
• intensity
• length of time between decision and consequence
• abstraction of consequences

Games are decisions followed by consequences. On the action side of the spectrum we get games that gives consequences soon after decisions are made. On the other end – rpg/strategy – we get games that give consequences far later.

Abstract consequences become necessary for all decisions to matter. Too difficult to design for otherwise.

The payoff for an experience is also extended on the right side (of the spectrum).

Conclusion: Relationship between an experience X, and the rewards, R, for having experience X:

• X is a char introduction, R is his problem
• X is a decision, R is the pass/fail, change in game state

investment-payoff cycle size: short, medium, long

return on investment (ROI) cycle size: short, medium, long

Examples:

• short: Devil May Cry, Halo, Forza 3, Super Mario 64, Starcraft – high intensity, short bursts
• medium: Zelda: Ocarina of Time, Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, Shadows of the Colossus, Monkey Island – exploration mixed with action, moderate story
• long: Final Fantasy 8, Fallout 3, Skyrim, Deus Ex, Civilization 5 – long-term strategy, fuzzy reasoning, heavy story

I’ll provide a link here to the discussion of “create” when it goes up.

Play. Create. Share.

You’ve heard this stuff in many places, if you’re avid game player or developer. I think it’s the “motto” for Little Big Planet. It should be the one of Minecraft. That game is the only one that deserves it.

What is the phrase trying to get at? “Play, create, share.” It is after the social generation. Facebook, twitter, the internet. Games are social tools. Minecraft lets you post shit to youtube, your creations. Facebook is like a game, though all the mechanics are based around text (and pictures), and there’s very little interpretation done by a system – save feeds etc. Shooters have multiplayer modes, always, whether to their benefit or not.

What’s the reason for all this? Fast marketing, virality. You want to leverage the power of people’s existing social contacts. Many games do this poorly. Many do it well. That’s obvious. What’s important here?

I spent several years studying social networks. I worked on one for a while back in my employment days. I came up with some technology for facilitating group work, and more particularly, getting the content produced by one person in the hands of someone else who might need it. Not through the social graph – not using that – but through the patterns in how people consumed things: that’s how I did it. I’ve been working on this tech for a long time.

Imagine if you read 20 books, and everyone else read 20 books. We can find patterns in your books that link you to any given person in a comprehensive way. Your 20 are a unique statement about your tastes. Beyond that, how you browse our suggestions – the ones given by the hypothetical system – give those 20 context. We can find out what you like. We project into your future, statistically, by finding comparisons with other readers. These comparisons are fuzzy.

Imagine if your friend talked about the movies he liked, and you listened. You should be able to project what other movies he might like, based on what he’s said in the past – i.e. your relationship – and what he’s said just then. That’s what the system does. It performs a comprehensive analysis. Why don’t systems do this already? Well they do sort-of, just very poorly. Why? Because fuzzy design is hard.

How do you teach a machine the concept of “strong writing,” or “cliche plot,” or “cerebral action?” How can you teach it something even more comprehensive, like: “I found the lead attractive for her softness and humility, and her hidden reserve of power.” How does the system know what a statement made by a user means based on who that person is? “I want something intelligent,” means something wildly different depending on who’s saying it.

This is my area of personal study. I understand it very well. What does this have to do with games? Well, you see, the most important thing for a fuzzy system – something that can understand who you are, predict your tastes – is comprehensive data. The best way to collect good data is through a system that is interactive. See where this is going? If I wanted to predict your tastes in music the best thing for me to do is get to know you. The best way to do that is to build a relationship. The best way to do that is interact.

You play a game, learn its ins and outs, then you create something based on that knowledge. In Minecraft you are always switching between explorer and crafter. “Mine” – “craft.” Get it? You mine for 2 minutes to get one thing you need, then craft for a while, using what you got. Then you mine for 3 more – a longer time because you are more well equipped – then go back to crafting. You alternate between getting what you need – and thinking about what you’ll build with it – and building – while thinking about what you went through to get what you have, and what you’ll need to go through next to get what you want. Mine, craft. Mine, craft.

Sharing fits into Minecraft elegantly. Sharing is not even native to the mechanics, though it is to the concept. People share on youtube, blogs. Then they sign up for special public servers and play together, then share that on youtube and blogs. The game gets around. Why? Because it’s personal. The products of your labor are personal in Minecraft. They are a statement about you.

What if the social networking features of facebook, the personal creation aspects of Minecraft, and the mechanics of other great games were combined into a single experience? Player plays, creates, shares…. That’s what I’m working towards.

Magic Systems in Games are Bullshit …

… and can be so much better.

Here’s a bunch of crap I wrote in TIGs about magic systems. Since I’ve been semi working on one for a while, at least in theory … here’s the post:

I’m always nervous with systems like these. When I first looked at Minecraft I didn’t get it. Everything seemed to require so much knowledge to do. The knowledge was tough to get, and required some serious repetitive stuff: trial-and-error. But then I watched other people play, was told to look at the wiki – by a child – and played. The 360 version of Minecraft gives recipes in your menu from the beginning. I think there’s probably some ideal place between knowing nothing as a player and being told something. But even without finding that place Minecraft is incredibly popular. Though in part that’s due to its virality.

Anyway. What if the system was partially randomized? So if you had 10 symbols, and each had a different property, what if you swapped what each one meant? Then players would really have to figure the system out. Though if the figuring out process is too much for the average player – as it is with Minecraft (most of us read the wiki) – then that idea would be a bad one.

Secret of Evermore had a crafting system for spells, though more limited. You learned recipes from characters – cool – then got ingredients as treasure, or from your dog sniffing for them – cool (though repetitive after a while). Then you cast spells. There were some crossovers between ingredient lists, but basically that stuff was too complex to keep track of. You leveled up spells – bad design decision – and basically chose to equip the stronger spell from a group that used similar ingredients.

They should have focused more on what the ingredients were. Maybe you had to be super careful and conservative with some, planning out what you would need for which, thinking, “well, I’m going to a volcano next, so there’s likely a lot of ash there, which powers my fireballs, which snakes are weak against – whatever – and I see a lot of snakes now but I’ll see even tougher ones later, so I’ll use a different spell instead.”

Instead you just cast your reserves, ran out, then swapped to a new spell whose ingredients match your area, trying to level up a few. When the spells get strong enough regular combat matters less – another huge problem with the precursor: Secret of Mana.

Testing out crafting strategies in Minecraft is basically boring for me. I’m sure most people feel that way. But having friends and wikis and stuff is huge. What if the crafting/testing process was fun? Like learning how to combine things was part of the game, core mechanics? In FF6, or most of the games in the series, I enjoyed replaying bosses, to avoid grinding. I would try again and again, slowly tweaking my party setup and my in-battle strategy. 3 things I had to keep in mind:

1. What I was executing incorrectly in battle.
2. What the ideal strategy is, assuming I executed well.
3. What the ideal setup is, assuming I find the ideal strategy for it, and I execute it well.

So battle was fun. Why? Because it was a testing ground for my own skills and knowledge of my resources. Nothing beats experimentation when you have to figure out how element X work with element Y.

How does this relate to magic? Long story, but you get where I’m going with this. What if the player went out on a mission. There are 3 inventory management points:

1. At base – full control (access to all resources, trunk, store etc).
2. Outside of battle – semi control (access to everything carried).
3. Inside battle – limited control (access to everything equipped).

Now when the player fights some monster he tries out a bunch of different things. Maybe he has the ) + / spell. Maybe that spell is like 50% fire, 20% garbage, 30% wind. There are effects accordingly. The player not only tests the strategy of fire and wind, but how it combines with other spells, and how it does in that particular environment, as well as what the owned spell is actually comprised of. He figures out the mechanics while figuring out the magic system.

Just some thoughts. We could do this for a while.

ps.

“Figuring out” crafting recipes can be fun. People craft in Skyrim and so on. You say you like it. I like it too sometimes. Creating robots in your robot workshop in Robotrek ruled for me. Though that wasn’t really crafting, just fancier leveling…. Anyway, the key for me – for a crafting system – is that the process of crafting ties me to the world. In FF, when I’m building parties I’m running battle scenarios through my head. The spells and moves and monsters play around in my imagination. In Minecraft I’m sort of thinking some heavily pixelated shape kind of looks like a real object I know, maybe, I don’t know, then just guess at stuff.

You can see the full thread, with context, if you want: http://forums.tigsource.com/index.php?topic=31902.0

My 3 best ideas

1. “Gameplay” is impossibly deep, uses as much of your mind as possible.
2. AIs that evolve.
3. A tool that captures your creative output, then mixes it with everyone else’s to create something better.