» Game Design
Friday, October 5, 2007
James Wallis getting ARGy with Perplex City creator
Now and again, and it seems like lately it’s a little more often, I stumble across some neat little bit of info, and it may have been known to others already or by some much more obvious means, but it still makes me go “holy crap” and get all bouncy with anticipation of what could result. Take yesterday: I was reading James Wallis’ blog (Mr. Wallis, former Hogshead guy and doughty game designer, will not be unfamiliar to longtime Cave readers), specifically a post about a neat thing I’d seen a few days prior but hadn’t gotten off my ass to post for some reason, and… hey. Wait a minute. “My colleague, Adrian Hon”??? At a firm called Six to Start, that comes right out with “we make alternate reality games”? Well, damn if that’s not a glimmer of hope for a genre I was starting to lose faith in. Very interesting news for Wallis’ career as well.
So I’m all into that, but I shouldn’t keep burying the equally-interesting news that Hon and Wallis are trumpeting to begin with: Let’s Change The Game, a design contest to create a fundraising ARG for Cancer Research UK. Stories are the best motivating force on the planet as far as I’m concerned, and they seem particularly potent when juiced up with the particular energy of alternate-reality gaming - this is a smart and heartening project.
Thursday, September 13, 2007
I’m in ur Magic, walkin ur planez: crazy new upcoming card type merits a look
If you’re like me and have a spot of Magic: the Gathering in your past, but have more or less lost interest in all the little furniture-rearrangements and wacky new kitchen appliances they’ve added to that house over the years… well, it looks like as of the next big block of cards, they’ve added a whole new room. The Planeswalker cards have an entirely new currency (Loyalty points), don’t interact with all the other cards in conventional ways, and (like a lot of other recent new stuff in MtG) seem crazy-powerful. It really feels like they’ve added a chunk of new game, rather than sub-games. And the above-linked article is surprisingly readable if you have only primary-school-level Magic knowledge (again, like me). Will this become a thriving part of the game, or is it the new phasing? Discuss.
Monday, January 9, 2006
Battle Of The Board Game Design Stars!
Because “discussion” is not as cool. Discussion is never as cool. Come on, people, I shouldn’t have to tell you that. The industry gathering Protospiel brings us an engaging virtual panel discussion of game design with industry luminaries James Ernest, Reiner Knizia, Tom Jolly, Bruno Faidutti, Alan Moon and more.
Thursday, September 30, 2004
ARG: another acronym to embrace before it destroys you
Many of you likely know all about I Love Bees, the mysterious site the URL for which was flashed briefly at the end of an online trailer for Microsoft’s upcoming first-person shooter Halo 2. You may also remember the promotional online puzzle games that tied in with Steven Spielberg’s A.I., which games came to be known collectively as “The Beast” and whose community of players called themselves the Cloudmakers. Rich with game-world detail, convincing characters and sometimes-fiendish puzzles, these alternate reality games, or ARGs, are… well… basically just LARPs. I Love Bees recently took another step closer to LARPhood when it not only challenged players to find and answer pay phones being called by an in-game AI, but anointed the answerers of certain calls with membership in the “crew” of the AI’s lost spaceship.
One player is not happy. Eric Burns laments that the collaboration with strangers in real time that made his experience in the Cloudmakers so compelling will be weakened and eventually destroyed by this singling out of a few lucky players. But collective-detection to unlock a story is basically How to Host a Murder - you can keep fiddling with the puzzles and the means of revelation, but you can’t disguise the fact that, after all the fire and motion, you are still just waiting for the next piece of story to consume. A story is not a game. ARGs are now making the leap from that model to the model of Mind’s Eye Theater - by adding actual gameplay. So far, it’s just the game of Prisoner’s Dilemma; do you, the individual, stick with the group, or do you defect? Other games are possible in ARGs, and we will no doubt see more than a few of those possibilities soon. The question is whether going from the How to Host a Murder model to the model of today’s LARPs will come with the same loss of accessibility - and popularity.
Monday, May 17, 2004
Will it play in Mystara– uh, I mean Peoria?
Why you should bookmark the new Gamethink weblog immediately, despite the Orwell-esque title: “I’m shooting here for perspectives anchored in practical understanding of the possible, for rolegaming as a commercial pursuit as well as a social one.” Word up to that.
Friday, January 24, 2003
Tuesday, December 10, 2002
Steve Jackson Needs YOUR Help (again)
Steve Jackson Games has some new job openings for the aspiring game designer. They are looking for an expert on India to fact-check their manuscript for GURPS India. If you have ever lived there, or have studied the region extensively, send your qualifications to Mr. Andrew Hackard. Also, you ace RPG cartographers should dig out your portfolios and send a sample of your best work to Ms. Mia Sherman.
Friday, December 28, 2001
Time Machine Returns
I just learned on the gamebook mailing list that the wonderful Time Machine series of interactive books has been re-released in eBook format. Although aimed at children, these are among the most effectively-written and interesting of the many “Choose Your Own Adventure”-type books released in the eighties. At $3.99 each, the new electronic editions cost twice as much as the original paperbacks did, but it’s still a pretty good deal if you want to relive your childhood adventures or learn about history in a game-like manner. The series can be purchased at Amazon.com and several other sellers of eBooks.
Tuesday, February 6, 2001
The Politics Of Dancing - No, Actually The Economics of RPG Design
I’m not a big RPG guy, but that news about adding “mystical gateways” to the Forgotten Realms canon is interesting. Yes, it will unbalance campaigns that get crazy with them, but for some campaigns it may be the balance they want. But that’s not what I’m thinking about.
Read More…
Friday, February 2, 2001
For those who have lives
For those who have lives and therefore don’t pay any attention to Slashdot, they had an intriguing discussion on zero-sum games today.
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