Randomness is very important in game design! This is because randomness allows us to make the game state larger and more complex, without overwhelming the player with too much information and therefore calculation. I’ve been writing about randomness for over a decade at this point, but this article represents my latest, most updated views on …
Randomness, and “Random Value Absorption Thresholds” Read More »
Gamelessness — the feeling of desperately wanting to play a game, but being unable to find a specific game that you want to play. I’ve experienced a lot of this, particularly over the last twenty years. It’s a big reason why I’m a game developer, and why game development as an activity tends to win …
When you’re offered a handful of powers that are highly coupled, and there’s no restriction on picking one over the other, the choice is obvious. If the powers are loosely coupled the choice will be random/arbitrary. In either case, it’s not going to be an interesting decision in my opinion. If you missed it, over …
“Pick 1 of 3” is a missed game design opportunity Read More »
Over the years, I’ve had some trouble expressing my point of view about pre-game asymmetric choices (characters, factions, etc) in games. Back in 2013 I wrote “Debunking Asymmetry“, which was my most clumsy attempt, and which awarded me over 100 comments, from notable game designers like Naomi Clark, Raph Koster, Greg Costikyan, Jon Schafer and …
Okay, I have two objectives here: 1). To talk about the effects of longer arcs, both in storytelling and in game design, and 2). To talk about what an amazing show Crazy Ex-Girlfriend is. Actually, this was the main thing, really. But I did connect some stuff that I observed from this show into a …
Larger-arc contextualization, and Crazy Ex-Girlfriend Read More »
I’ve been doing a lot of thinking over the last few years about short arcs and long arcs in strategy game design. “Short arcs” would be referring to local, short term operations – so in a tactical game, this might mean “defeating THIS unit” or “making sure that unit doesn’t reach this area”, etc. Longer …
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