FW: [MUD-Dev] Interesting EQ rant (very long quote)

[John Buehler]

Raph Koster writes:

>> In that they permit players to pursue ambitious goals, investing of
>> themselves in their character.  As you seem to desire, that
>> produces the emotional ties to the game that brings the player back
>> over and over again.  The presence of other players means that a
>> given player's ability to pursue those ambitious goals is more or
>> less hindered.

> Why? Why is it not helped? After all, such goals are almost always
> validated by showing off the achievement to another person. It's the
> rare person who doesn't celebrate an achievement by mentioning to
> someone else that they managed it, in order to receive
> congratulations. This mechanic is impossible without other players.

> This doesn't even touch on goals which require the presence of other
> players, in a more game-mechanical sense.

Players certainly aid in obtaining entertainment from a game.  But if
I look at a game from a quality of service standpoint for player X, I
have the problem of other players getting involved in player X's
experiences.  Obviously, this is the difference between a single
player game and a multi player game.  The more ambitious the goal, the
greater the reward.  The greater the reward, the more people who will
be interested in obtaining it.  But if the reward is limited (thus
enhancing its value), then a number of those who are aspiring to it
will be disappointed.

That might be entirely acceptable for a serious-minded, good-natured
player.  But I don't believe that most players are interested in just
the pursuit of lofty goals.  They want to achieve them.  This isn't
something that a multi player game is set up to provide consistently.
I think that the entertainment that *can* be consistently provided,
regardless of other players' actions, is a more modest level of risk
and reward.  The house of cards isn't as high, and is more able to
withstand the little breezes produced by other players.  A grief
player comes along and blows directly on houses of cards, and there is
no game structure that I can think of that make a dedicated grief
player a non-issue.

>>> I ask because I agree with the conventional wisdom--muds usually
>>> only recognize a very narrow subset of human activity--and even
>>> human entertainment. And in fact in your other posts, you have
>>> argued for being more entertaining to a larger group of people,
>>> not less.

>> I'm not trying to promise players the exhiliration of amassing
>> power, wealth, items or anything else.

> Those are all a very very narrow subset of human entertainment, as I
> said.  And I grant the point that thier achievement is in some
> degree hindered by the presence of other people.

Well, of those interested in providing exhilirating entertainment,
that's all I've seen.  Nte that accumulating power includes
politically-minded games.  Can you suggest other forms of
entertainment that will be compelling without significant risk of
other players inhibiting satisfying gameplay?

>> I'm trying to come up with lighter, less compelling entertainment,
>> but covering a large spectrum of activities.

> Are you sure you want to use the term "less compelling"? There are
> plenty of light forms of entertainment which are extremely
> compelling. Another term for entertainment that is not compelling is
> "boring" and I don't think that is what you are shooting for.

Another term for compelling is life-threatening, and I don't think
that's what you're shooting for either.  In both cases, I think we can
assume that we're after the ability to entertain people and to
maintain their attention in the very least.  I'd like to see my
players show up for an hour on two weeknights and maybe three hours on
a Saturday, but only one weekend a month.  A serious player shows up
for two hours each weeknight.  I would consider my game a failure if I
racked up the play time that EverQuest seems to have.

Does any game designer really want people that absorbed in their game?

>> It is geared towards the socializer and explorer, with a lesser
>> emphasis on satisfying the killer and achiever.

> Socializers are the MOST emotionally invested in your world, though.

Consider that socializers get carried away because of the amount of
time that they spend in the game world.  As a result of all that time
spent, they form online relationships and get carried away with them.
Having those relationship involving exhilirating entertainment only
adds to the addictive qualities.

Then consider a game where players are not in the game that much and
where the activities are far simpler.  Engaging, but not emotionally
so.  Players drop into the Microsoft Gaming zone and do their thing.
Sometimes they meet up with people they've met before and sometimes
not.

I will attempt to manage the intensity of the social experience just a
I will attempt to manage the intensity of all other
player-type-specific experiences.

In the example of socializers, I'm tempted to not provide a 'tell'
capability.  Players will immediately circumvent that mechanism by
using ICQ or whatever.  And I'm perfectly fine with that.  But they
will have to identify themselves to other players.  Which is different
from their character.  If they want to rely on their virtual character
in order to communicate, I'll only permit them to do so as roleplayers
or only as much as they stay near each other geographically.

Players who are not interested in interacting with other players -
even through some tacit acknowledgement of their real world identity
through ICQ or email - don't get to keep up with other players who
move their characters around in the world.

>> As I claimed in another reply to one of your posts, single player
>> games (like books or movies) are well-suited to intense
>> experiences, while multiplayer games - particularly those where you
>> don't know who you'll be interacting with - are less capable of
>> reliably providing such experiences.

> Whereas my impression is very much that online games provide
> experiences of far greater intensity than single-player games do. I
> grant the point that they do so erratically. But if your goal is to
> eliminate the erraticism, then the approach should be to make
> single-player games. :)

Touche.  Well, perhaps obviously, I'm postulating that multi player
games can be employed to provide a consistent, lighter form of
entertainment.

>> Because I can't guarantee the way that my players will interact
>> with each other, I'm trying to lessen their belief that they will
>> become mayors, barons and kings.  Only one guy gets to be a king,
>> and he's the most extreme player in the game.

> Sure. If what you mean by a house of cards is, don't let players
> feel like they have achieved any special rank or role, then I see
> what you mean.

> On the other hand, I think that this form of entertainment is
> largely about persona wish-fulfillment. If you are interested in
> reaching the casual gamer, it might be worthwhile to find out what
> sort of fantasies they wish to fulfill. Based on the bestselling
> novels that hit that audience, it might well be that they all wish
> to be wisecracking PIs, spies, and spunky Victorian debutantes.

Those are the very ambitions that I'm postulating are well-matched to
the single player game.  The single player game is very much a modern
adaptation of a book.  I believe that multi player games can be used
to promise light entertainment.

The house of cards comments are directed at getting players to pursue
rank or role when there isn't much of a guarantee that they'll be able
to achieve that.  EverQuest deals with this by making the game
essentially a single player game.  Players CAN achieve the ranks and
roles that they aspire to.  What nobody tells the players early on is
that player CAN achieve the ranks and roles.  All of 'em.  All it
takes is time or money.

So I guess I'm saying that there are two recipes for rank:

1. Ensure that players achieve the rank, meaning that the rank has no
real value.  After a time, everyone is level 50 in EverQuest.

2. Ensure that the achievement of rank is more naturally challenging,
such as the case of having a single king, with competition determining
the eventual winner.  In this case, only one player achieves the rank
and all others are left to derive their entertainment from the pursuit
itself.

Both stategies are viable, but neither is a recipe that I would like
to push past casual gamers.  I don't see rank or power being something
that I can deliver in a satisfying way, so I just stay away from it.

>> My joke is that Simutronics is talking about creating a game called
>> "Hero's Journey".  My game is "Peasant's Journey".  Because I
>> figure I can have 10,000 peasant players, but not 10,000 hero
>> players.  Not in any true sense of the word.  I don't believe that
>> a game world can actually deliver on the 'hero' promise.

> To everyone, I assume you mean. It certainly can and does deliver on
> it to a select few--your argument depends on that fact (the inequity
> and therefore inevitable jealousies and complaints).

Yes, that's what I mean.  As I've suggested, the actual competitive
pursuit (even without winning) is entertainment for a lot of people.
I assume that such people are not representative of the casual gamer
base.  (If it even exists in a viable form)

JB

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