[MUD-Dev] Casual Crowd vs.Time Rich Crowd [was: Time Debt]

[Koster, Raph]

HRose wrote:
> Raph Koster wrote:

>>> Players don't pay for a game they don't play.

>> A disturbingly large number of them do, actually.

> I know this. In fact I'm subscribed to FFXI even if I don't log in
> from months. But this doesn't disproof what I wrote.

I wasn't trying to disprove what you wrote.

> I simply think that is overly stupid to develop a game that
> doesn't want you to play.

I agree with this, nor was I advocating doing so.

> My line you quoted there is surely wrong if you take it in its
> absolute meaning. But the fact is that you cannot read it, prove
> that it is wrong and so demonstrate its contrary: "you can design
> successful games that incentivate players to stay offline".  Both
> in what I write and what you write there's a sub-text.

Yes, and you keep getting the subtext in mine wrong. The surface
text, too. :)

>   1- "Players don't pay for a game they don't play" has the
>   subtext "incentivate the players to play because here is the
>   success" > 2- "A disturbingly large number of them do, actually"
>   has the subtext "the success of a game isn't tied to the fact
>   that players use to play it"

The word "disturbing" should indicate that I don't exactly find this
desirable. From a strictly monetary point of view, and looked at in
the short-term, of course, it is. But not from a longer-term
retention point of view. If I find it disturbing that there are many
players like this, you should conclude that I don't much like it,
from a game design point of view.

> This is what I mean. It's true that there are players that don't
> play but pay. But this isn't useful to draw a positive design
> strategy. Designing a game for players that don't play not only
> will make you loose those who play. But also those who don't.

There is a distinction between a game for players who don't play,
and a game that tries to make players not play. I would argue that
designing a game for players who don't play is probably a good idea
and a positive design strategy. But that's probably just me failing
to parse your last couple of sentences there.

I think we can agree that designing a game that discourages players
from playing regularly is probably a bad idea (at least in terms of
mass acceptance--some games, like turn based games, PBEM, etc, have
some flex here). Designing a game which allows players not to HAVE
to play regularly, however, seems desirable.

> There are peoples that buy cars and then don't use them. So you
> think that you can develop a successful car that doesn't move?

No. Why do you think I believe that?

> P.S.

>   And let's focus on the content and not on the form. The line you
>   quoted is "truth" if you consider the context of my message,
>   "false" if you isolate it, like you did.

I was not answering the context. I was answering the direct
statement. Sometimes tossing in some hard data to cast fresh light
on a statement can stir up new ideas.

>   At the other side your message here is "false" if we consider
>   its context, "true" if we consider it isolated (since I cannot
>   argue nothing that you wrote here). What I did in this message
>   is to provide back the context to mine and your message to
>   demostrate that mine is true and your false.

>   You win on the form, I win on the content :)

A stray comment is not a debate. We're not debating anything. For
some reason you frame a very large number of your comments as if I
were engaging you in a debate about something. :P In the NEXT
paragraph, I'll debate you.

>   I have many design ideas on how to solve the problem about
>   "Casual Crowd vs.Time Rich Crowd" and they are along the lines
>   of creating different structures inside the game where different
>   players have different roles and goals. Where casual players
>   have a specific role and goal and where time rich crowds have
>   another. And the *key* is about giving them different roles but
>   making they play *together* with the same general goal.

The difficulty here is that is the roles have contributions to the
goal inversely proportionate to the time investment required, that
people will start to cross the roles in search of maximum
return. The time-rich players will take on the casual roles because
they offer greater reward for time invested. And if the casual roles
do NOT offer greater reward for time invested, then they will not
feel rewarding to the casual players either, who will compare
themselves to the time-rich players and cry foul.

The difficulty would be sharing a given metric across both
roles--and if there is a shared goal, there will most certainly be
some form of shared metric. I'd tend to approach this in terms of
orthognal but equally valid goals, ideally with interesting
intersections.

-Raph
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