[MUD-Dev] Re: Fun vs Realism [ Was: OT: Sid Meier ]

[Caliban Tiresias Darklock]

On 11:45 AM 7/28/98 -0700, I personally witnessed Adam Wiggins jumping up
to say:
>
>Again - you can't tell me what's fun.  I know what's fun, and killing tons
>of things is not it.  I find it *much* more satisfying to overcome a
>single, worthy opponent than many weak, stupid ones.  

In the end, we only really know what WE think is fun. For example, the
'Mortal Kombat' style games leave me pretty bored. Even when I'm playing
another human being. 

Some people like a BIG challenge. Some people like a small one. Some people
like a long, involved game (Dungeon Keeper needs a lot of waiting around
and screaming at your on-screen creatures to hurry up and do what you told
them to). Some people like a fast, background-process kind of game (Quake
can pretty much be started at any level and played for minutes or hours
without conscious thought at all). Some people like to play human
opponents. Some people prefer computer opponents. Some people like to
cheat. Some people think cheating is unconscionable. Some people just like
to hack the game; Master of Orion was completely uninteresting to me as a
game, but I played it a lot just so I could hack into the saved game files,
decipher the format, and see what sort of logic it was using. Some people
like very technical interfaces (MS Flight Simulator comes to mind; rudder
pedals, six-axis joystick, and a few dozen buttons). Some people like very
simple ones (The pinball game that ships with Win95: Z - left flipper, / -
right flipper, X - nudge table left, . - nudge table right, space - nudge
table forward). 

There is one thing that pretty much everyone thinks is fun: winning. It's
how you get there that we need to be concerned with in terms of what is or
isn't fun. Sometimes, having fun IS winning, on 'endless' games. If your
game never really ends, like SimEarth, then having a good time while you're
playing is really the only win condition. If you hate the game, you just
lost. Lost what? About thirty to fifty bucks, usually. Ten if you waited
for it to hit the bargain bin. ;)

I'm of the personal opinion that the biggest mistake a game designer can
make is designing a game based on what someone ELSE thinks is fun, because
inevitably he'll do a bad job -- and not notice, because he wouldn't be
having fun if he did a good job either. Designing a game should be based on
what YOU think is fun. If that's not what the rest of the world thinks is
fun, then you're probably not going to be a good *commercial* game
designer. (That would indicate you should design free or shareware games
and be grateful if anyone registers.) 

But if you like designing games, and you design games you enjoy playing,
who cares if you get paid for it? Game designers who make good money are
pretty few and far between in the first place -- most of your compensation
is in the form of recognition and job satisfaction. Garth Bigelow designed
probably the best game I have ever seen in my life, and made a total of
about $30,000 over the course of five years from it. That ain't much. But
he loved what he was doing, and he created something he could be proud of,
and if I met him walking down the street in Vineyard Haven I would really
be impressed and want to tell him all about how great I thought his game
was. And how many people in the world even remember Ultimate Universe?