Help on designing a game (LONG)
Molley the Mage
design technique, and in fact I confess to having used this method
myself. The example given was well-written and very interesting, but
I think it was more an example of what all MUDs wish they were rather
than illustrative of the type of games I gather most people on this
newsgroup are writing. That's not to take away from the example at
all; as I said, it was quite well-done (and looked like a game I would
enjoy playing, if it existed :-).
Having seen other posts on the topic, I'll take this opportunity to
delve into my own philosophy of game design, and let the comments flow
freely!
First of all, I agree with a previous posting that Story must come
before all else. If you think you can just sit down and start
creating rooms, characters, and objects, and have them create the
story for you, then you belong in the Oz project :-). Seriously,
though, at least a sketchy plot outline is a must before you can
decide on anything else. I believe that writing a good IF game is
difficult enough _with_ a plot outline, even a detailed one; trying to
generate the game and the plot simultaneously could only lead to
disaster. One important thing to consider before you begin developing
the plot is the setting of your story. Will it be fantasy, cyberpunk,
"real" world? Each of these has its own unique characteristics not
shared by the others, and the genre of your story will be an
overriding factor in most of the other decisions you will make.
For me, the main characters naturally follow the plot. If you're
going to have a story, then it will probably be inhabited (unless it's
the ever-popular IF translation of Waiting for Godot, of course).
Thinking about the major NPC's and their role in the story can also
lead you to some ideas about locations ("rooms" in the vernacular)
which those major characters might inhabit.
Also, the plot itself will obviously lend a lot of structure to the world-
building. After all, if your plot revolves around the kidnapped Princess Amber
for example, then you're going to need some kidnappers and a secret
dungeon/tower/cave/whatever for them to keep her in. At this point I
try and sketch out a rough map of the "world" -- not a traditional
"hint book" map with little boxes, lines, and arrows, but a map such
as might be found in an atlas in the world I'm trying to build.
Make this map as large and encompassing as possible, so that your world
will have depth beyond the scope of what you might actually chose to
code. Games without a solid background usually aren't as enjoyable,
since the suspension of disbelief becomes more difficult. Mark the
major locations on the map (Princess Amber's castle, the kidnappers'
hideout, the city of Bigtownia, Whispering Woods, etc.).
With the major areas marked on the map, you can often get a visual "cue" about
the direction the player will take in progressing through the story.
"Let's see... he should start at the castle, of course, and then down into the
town, where..." Thinking about this "direction" will also help you flesh
out the major plot elements -- why is the player going to go from one
place to the next? For example, he will start in the castle and get
his mission from the King/Wizard/Vizier/High Priest/Head of the
Guards/whoever. He's going to need information and equipment, so down
into the town he goes. While puttering around the town, he
meets/discoveres the Informant/Witness/Crucial Clue #1/etc which
seems to indicate that the kidnappers fled west, into the Whispering
Woods. Or maybe there are several conflicting clues, each pointing in
a different direction? You get the idea.
While you are puttering around fleshing out the major plot elements, of course,
you are going to be getting lots of great ideas about people, places, and things
which might be in each section of the game. WRITE EVERYTHING DOWN!!!
Flashes of inspiration are all too rare, and even though you *think*
you'll remember all these great ideas later, trust me, you won't.
Brainstorm and take good notes. Later you can toss out the dumb or
inconsistent ideas. The important thing at this point is not to worry
about how you are going to implement these things, but to get them in
the story. I guarantee that nearly anything, no matter how grandiose,
can be implemented in a reasonable way with one of the many fine text
adventure authoring systems available today.
After all these ideas have bounced around in your head and (hopefully)
been recorded, you will have a large collection of random thoughs
about places, people, and things. Start organizing them, and as you
do, begin outlining the specific steps that our hero is going to take.
If there are branch points where any of multiple options will be
successful, list that as well. It might be helpful to diagram the
plot, showing the major "sections" of the game. Make sure that the
majority of the plot is well-fleshed out before you start coding
anything, or you will run out of ideas halfway through and wind up
with an unfinished game. There are many testimonials to confirm this.
Now you should have a fairly-detailed plot outline, some major
locations and characters, and probably a lot of good ideas for puzzles
or "obstacles" which will be in the player's path to victory. After
all, a story isn't very exciting without some conflict, right?
Depending on the type of game you are writing, these obstacles might
range from actual fights to conversational gambits to giving the right
object to the right person, to answering problems and riddles... the
list is endless. Play any two IF games, and you will probably find
some of all of the above types of puzzles, but each will also have one
or two that don't fit the mold. This is the mark of good puzzle
design. I do *not* recommend that you sit down and try to figure out
what every puzzle, problem, and conundrum is going to be for the
entire game.
The task of puzzle-writing will often resolve itself
when you are developing the individual rooms and objects, because
objects naturally suggest links to one another that you can exploit
for puzzles. Indeed, at this point I would say that it is time to
start getting your hands dirty and plunge into the story feet-first.
Take each of your general areas (the castle, for example) and fill in
the blanks. Someone suggested that you not make a detailed map; to
confuse you further, I will disagree and say that you should. I
*always* make maps. The box-and-line-style, no less. It helps me
organize my thoughts and decide what sort of locations I haven't added
yet.
Make sure that you design your areas in a logical, consistent
manner. If you're building a castle, don't put the stables on the
second floor. If you make a room for one of the four towers, you
should make one for the others. Be consistent. But don't go
overboard -- making ten rooms for each step of the hallway between the
throne room and the bailey is probably going to be incredibly
excessive and bore the player to death. In fact, (as an aside) I
rarely implement hallways with more than one location unless they are
extremely long or important. Don't try and figure out what objects
are going to be in each room yet; just design the place. Once you
have a map of the area, start writing the descriptions of each room.
Think about the type of object that would normally be found in that
location and if you want one in the game, put it there. While you are
doing this puzzles and interesting interactions will suggest
themselves to you as if by magic... I guarantee it! For example,
if you are designing a stables, there will probably be horses. And
straw. And a pitchfork. And a stableboy. And sugar for the horses.
Or maybe there is no sugar, and you need to ride a horse, but he won't
let you on until you give him a treat. The stableboy has the sugar,
but won't give it to you unless you bring him something, like a
scented ribbon from the Princess's maid he has a crush on... So now
you need a maid somewhere in the castle, and of course she won't give
you a ribbon unless you do something for her (maybe as simple as
charming her out of it with pretty words, maybe a kiss, maybe
something more difficult. Who knows?)
The possibilities are endless, and the more you write, the more things
will suggest themselves to you. The challenge is in weeding out the
bad or boring ones and filling your game with interesting and
enjoyable interactions that don't seem like "puzzles" and that don't
bring the plot to a crashing halt until they are finished. Again,
write everything down. Objects, people, puzzle ideas, room
descriptions. At some point you are now going to have to sit down at
your computer and code this stuff up, of course, but like any program,
the code should just be a way of telling the computer what you want it
to do. It's only a means to an end. If you have done all the
background work like I describe above (or some variation that works
better for you) then the coding should be a snap. Of course, that
also depends on the language you choose. I use TADS, but some people
prefer ALAN or another language.
One suggestion about the coding -- do each area individually. Don't
try and code the whole game in a sitting. If you have a castle, town,
forest, and secret hideout, for example, do each of them seperately.
It's much easier to debug the game a few rooms at a time then 50 or 60
at a time. My "development cycle" might look like this:
code-debug-code-debug-code-debug-playtest-debug-rewrite-debug-playtest.
In other words, I code an area, debug it, code the next, debug it, and
so on until I have what I think is a basically working game. Then I
have friends play it and find bugs. I fix those bugs. Then I get
their ideas and suggestions on improving the game, what they like,
didn't like, etc. If I agree, I change or modify the game
accordingly. This might require a significant change in the plot. I
then debug and playtest the modified game. Repeat as needed.
When coding an area, I try and do the basics first -- room
descriptions, exits, and major objects and characters. Only those
things essential to "play" the game and "win" it, in other words.
Once the "important" things are working correctly, I add the
decorations -- lots of objects, descriptions, secondary characters,
and other assorted etc. this makes your game seem like it takes place
in a real "world" and not in a computer where only a few things exist.
I try and give the player as many options and things to play with and
look at as I can, but be reasonable. There is no need to implement
actual "objects" for most of the things in your game -- eye-candy is
good for most of it. My rule of thumb is this: if a noun appears
in the room description, then the player should be able to do
something with that noun -- examine it and get another description at
the minimum. I hate it when a game tells you that some thing is in
the area but then doesn't recognize the word "tree" or "stump" or
"wagon" or whatever. I HATE THAT!!!!!! :-) So be thorough. Your
players will thank you for it.
Well, that's about the majority of my ideas on the subject. This has
been sort of a random rambling, so take it for what you will.
Comments, criticism, and shameless praise are all welcomed in any
measure deemed appropriate, and please note that the "game" ideas
above are not part of any game I am writing at the moment. They're
just rip-offs from other posts and ideas I came up with on the spot.
Take them if you want them, but I doubt you will :-)
Good luck!
Sean
--
M. Sean Molley, CS Department, Western Kentucky University, Bowling Green, KY
RealSpace : (502) 745-4027 | Email: mol...@wkuvx1.wku.edu | Life : Sucks
--
A bather whose clothing was strewed
By breezes that left her quite nude,
Saw a man come along,
And unless I'm quite wrong,
You expected this line to be lewd.
--
Darin Johnson
> before all else.
Just to be the jerk that disagrees...
Sometimes a story or subplot idea can come from an object, puzzle,
or room. These are often better integrated into the game than
when these were forced onto an existing story.
--
Darin Johnson
djoh...@ucsd.edu
Where am I? In the village... What do you want? Information...
Tom O Breton
> Having seen other posts on the topic, I'll take this opportunity to
> delve into my own philosophy of game design, and let the comments flow
> freely!
>
> First of all, I agree with a previous posting that Story must come
> before all else.
Not if you mean that in the sense of a "plot" for the game, a sequence
of things which must happen, if not in precise order, at least with
strong order constraints.
> Seriously, though, at least a sketchy plot outline is a must before you
> can decide on anything else.
I surmise that you do indeed mean it that way.
I'm puzzled to see the number of posts here that want to do that. Isn't
having a "plot" throwing away 90% of the power of the interactive
medium? Looks to me like an awful lot of energy spent first making a
player go a certain way, and then trying to disguise the essentially
forced nature of the action.
Discussion question: Why do not-interactive stories have plots anyways?
(Aside from a little bit of experimental fiction that does not)
It's because the linear nature of the print medium forces a rigid,
unchangeable sequence. Following a protagonist's experience
chronologically is an obvious way of organizing this sequence.
IF has no such limit, so why force a plot on it? Is the motivation
simply to make a player explore your entire creation?
As an amateur writer, I can tell you that stories may come out like
that, but they don't go in like that. You (or at least I) start out with
a setting, atmosphere, motivation for the character(s), possibly a few
other characters (NPC's), climax to aim for, et.al. But IMO a story that
knows in any great detail where it is going comes off as forced.
All these things, setting, atmosphere, motivation, et al. can be used in
IF without a forced sequence.
So in summary, *why* use the print device of plot?
Tom
--
Having finished it's [sic] evil speech, the Tom spreads it's scaly
wings and soars away... (t...@world.std.com, TomB...@delphi.com)
James Mann
>Sometimes a story or subplot idea can come from an object, puzzle,
>or room. These are often better integrated into the game than
>when these were forced onto an existing story.
>
is, you should always try not to instill bad habits in your writing style.
Good writing comes not only out of ideas, but style as well, and bad habits can
lead to bad stories, even in an int-fiction game. Certainly, when you start
coding something, you may come across a different vehicle to convey your story,
and this should be looked at, but, generally, this is not the case.
Now, if when coding, an object cannot be coded to fit within the story, the
story should be changed to reflect what you have come up with, so that
everything meshes appropriately.
Every time I come up with an object that I would like to use, and write a
story around it, it generally turns out to be of poor quality. Now I try to
find some way to fit it into an existing story.
Take the time. Work the story out ahead of time. It will turn out better in
the long run.
--
CoH...@hebron.connected.com | Overheard at a bridge table:
@Stellar Genesis | "So, do you know the value of notrump?"
(jericho.connected.com 4040) | "Yeah, it sould be just a bit larger than
(Stellar down due to TD :( ) | your shoulders."
James Mann
>I'm puzzled to see the number of posts here that want to do that. Isn't
>having a "plot" throwing away 90% of the power of the interactive
>medium? Looks to me like an awful lot of energy spent first making a
>player go a certain way, and then trying to disguise the essentially
>forced nature of the action.
>
>IF has no such limit, so why force a plot on it? Is the motivation
>simply to make a player explore your entire creation?
>
>So in summary, *why* use the print device of plot?
>
(backwards-written) example as to why plotlines exist in IF:
I have a planet, and on this planet is a wrecked ship. How do I get players
to find what I have waiting for them onboard?
Okay, they have to know where this planet is, right? And how do I get them
to want to find out where the planet is?
I plant a rumor seed on board the station that the crashed vessel
originated from.
So, the players would have to:
- Hear the rumor while on board the station.
- Find the planet's location (this can be really easy, or incredibly
difficult).
- Travel to the planet.
- Find the crashed vessel.
- Search it to find the objects we want the player to find.
This, once all rolled into one unit, constitutes a plot thread. This is a
sequence of events that the player(s) should do to get to a desired goal, and,
hopefully, they will get it done without any extra prodding. Note that
anything can be done while at any point along this thread. Really good IF
games would have many different plot threads, and these can be intertwined into
such a difficult web to weave that even experienced players would enjoy playing
it many, many times, since it would be different just about every time, unless
of course they do it all exactly the way it was done before.
So, my idea of a really good IF game has the same thing that a really good
story has - lots of plotlines, tightly woven together.
This is the use of plotlines in IF.
Jason Noble
Thanks for your post, Sean. I think shameless praise would be the order of
the day; I found it comprehensive and very useful.
You referred to my piece of "simulated output" as being like what all MUDS
would like to be, and I agree with you. Perhaps I shouldn't have
perpetuated the ol' dungeon setting :).
I just have a few semi-related thoughts on MUDS and other IF:
Hands up all the people who, when they first found out about MUDS, thought
that they would never play or write 'conventional' IF again? After all,
what a brilliant solution to the problem of intelligent non-player
characters: just throw a whole bunch of players into the one game, realtime.
But then after a few MUD sessions, you come to see the poverty of the user
interface, and the (usually) poor parsing and descriptions. Disbelief is
difficult to keep suspended as wizards announce another impending crash due
to database bloat, everyone you meet asks you 'where you from in RL, dood?',
and what was supposed to be interactive fiction degenerates into something
that resembles IRC. (Nothing against IRC; I'm just saying that MUDS end up
resembling a whole bunch of people standing in a room chatting, and people
stop being imaginatively charitable vis a vis the cruddy world simulation
efforts).
I hope this description strikes a chord in some people. I strongly suspect
it's not just me. If you're a fervent MUD fan, then more power to you, but
*for me* they don't really work, at least not the current generation.
So where does this leave us? I would still have to say that the
puzzle-oriented or treasure-hunt oriented golden oldies from Infocom are the
most impressive pieces of IF around. Now it pains me to say this, because I
don't really like strict puzzle-oriented stuff (why the hell would the key
be in a bird's nest anyway?). Personally I am much more interested in
simulated worlds that have the power to suspend disbelief.
I admit that I haven't comprehensively looked at the IF that's around, just
taken a sample. I don't own LTOI, for instance, and I probably should buy
it. But the stuff I've downloaded from ftp.gmd.de has been ordinary at
best. Where is the impressive *interactive fiction*??!! It seems to me
that the systems are there (eg. TADS, ALAN, Inform) for writing good stuff.
There might even be money in it, judging by the sales of LTOI. And people
on rec.arts.int-fiction talk about all sorts of sophisticated ideas for
complex IF; I assume they write it too, but where is it?
Now don't just leap down my throat as someone who is too cheap to b- b- b-
buy (ugh... there I said it!) software. If you could prove to me that I
wasn't buying Zork 200 or The Revenge of Leisure Suit Larry, I would happily
shell out the cash. I have this sinking feeling that the IF I would really
enjoy simply isn't out there yet. As someone said in a previous post, the
IF version of Waiting For Godot is extremely popular. It seems to me that
if someone had written 'the real thing', they would be smart enough to
release a public domain teaser-demo, but I'm yet to see it.
I am happy to admit that the whole thing could be due to my own ignorance.
Please, tell me I'm wrong.
--- Thanks for reading.
Torbj|rn Andersson
> So where does this leave us? I would still have to say that the
> puzzle-oriented or treasure-hunt oriented golden oldies from Infocom
> are the most impressive pieces of IF around. Now it pains me to say
> this, because I don't really like strict puzzle-oriented stuff (why
> the hell would the key be in a bird's nest anyway?). Personally I
> am much more interested in simulated worlds that have the power to
> suspend disbelief.
The adventure games (or interactive fiction, if you prefer) that
impressed me the most were games like Deadline, Suspect, Border Zone
and A Mind Forever Voyaging (all by Infocom, but to be fair, I haven't
seen much else in the genre). While all of them, to some extent at
least, were puzzle-oriented (even A Mind Forever Voyaging has puzzles),
they primarily seemed, to me, to simulate a small word, and what was
happening in it.
It is true that you usually didn't have to poke very hard to break the
suspension of disbelief. With the memory-constraints these games were
under, I guess they had no choice but cutting down on the "unnecessary"
detail.
I guess I'm straying from the subject, but I just wanted to say that I
think there _have_ been attempts made to get away from the primarily
puzzle- or treasure-oriented, but I would guess it's a LOT more work
to make that kind of games than the more 'traditional' ones. There is
an article in /if-archive/infocom/articles/NZT-testing-text at
ftp.gmd.de, which, while rather short, I think illustrates some of the
problems one would have to face.
Torbj|rn Andersson
Molley the Mage
> mol...@wkuvx1.wku.edu (Molley the Mage) writes:
Note: >> Represent my original comments. > Represent Tom's replies.
>> First of all, I agree with a previous posting that Story must come
>> before all else.
>
> Not if you mean that in the sense of a "plot" for the game, a sequence
> of things which must happen, if not in precise order, at least with
> strong order constraints.
I'll address this and the other post I saw disagreeing with my
comments about "story" and plot in one fell swoop. When I describe
the "plot" of a game, I am referring to the story behind the
experience. No matter what anyone might say, any game that does not
have an underlying story is not going to be much of a game. So when I
say that "story must come before all else" what I mean is that if you
expect to sit down in front of a computer with a freshly loaded copy
of TADS 2.1, and start coding rooms, characters, and objects, then
have those things make up an enjoyable game, you are a far better
writer than I am.
I didn't mention this in my post, but one of the
things I try to do before I code a game is write out a narrative --
not an "output sample" but just a plain old prose narrative -- of the
events of the story as they might be perceived by an observer. So if
the game centers around the rescue of Princess Amber by a bold
adventurer, I'll write a short story about that very subject. It
helps get me in the mood and set the tone for the game itself.
As for "precise order", I don't think that is a requirement except in
certain kinds of games. In fact, I dealt with this very issue in a
post a while back, in which I came out as a strong proponent of
providing as much flexibility as possible to the player when deciding
"what to do next". I *don't* think the game should be tightly scripted
in the sense that there is always only one path to follow, and nothing
else makes any sense unless experienced in the correct sequence
envisioned by the author.
Take _Trinity_ for example, my all-time
favorite work of IF. In that game, there are eight (I believe)
"mushroom doors", through each of which is an "independent" section of
the game. By and large, each section can be completed on its own
merits, without needing objects or information from any other section.
There are a few exceptions. The "middle part" of the game, which is
the landscape in which these mushroom doors are set, has its own
puzzles and items. Some of the puzzles require items or information
from inside the mushroom doors, some don't. The point is that as a
player, I felt like there was always some other piece of the puzzle
that I hadn't explored and that was still available to me if I got
stuck at another point. This is a great example of non-forced order.
In that same game, however, there are examples of "forced" order, in
which the player must do something before he can continue with the
story. For example, at the beginning of the game in London, there is
a very specific series of actions which must be performed and a group
of items which must be collected from that scene before you can go on
to the next scene and hope to succeed. You are forced to do what the
author wants you to do, otherwise the story doesn't advance. This,
like it or not, is what makes a game a *game* and not just some
"interactive world" you wander around in.
Do you think a game like _Trinity_ was written slapdash, with no idea
of plot? I can tell you that it wasn't. The amount of background
research that went in before a single line of code was written was
immense -- check out the bibliography in the package sometime. Sure,
the author changed some things as he went -- who doesn't? But by and
large, he knew what the game was going to be about and how it was
going to proceed before he did a single thing. He *HAD* to, otherwise
it would have been an incoherent mess.
>> Seriously, though, at least a sketchy plot outline is a must before you
>> can decide on anything else.
>
> I surmise that you do indeed mean it that way.
What I mean is that if you don't know what kind of game you want to
write and what you want the story to be about before you start
writing, what you will end up with will not be much fun to play. In
my games I try and provide as much "freedom" -- as many alternate
paths through the story -- as I can. The player doesn't have to visit
every location or speak to every character or pick up every object,
and two players might get two different endings (or twenty, if I had
that much time to put in). But the fact is that trying to write a
story without plot is like trying to bake a cake without flour --
sure, you can do it, but it won't taste much like a cake.
> I'm puzzled to see the number of posts here that want to do that. Isn't
> having a "plot" throwing away 90% of the power of the interactive
> medium? Looks to me like an awful lot of energy spent first making a
> player go a certain way, and then trying to disguise the essentially
> forced nature of the action.
I'm sorry, but we are going to have to agree to disagree here :-).
This comment and your earlier note about not wanting to make a list of
"a sequence of things which must happen" convince me that you and I
will probably never agree on this point.
"Isn't having a 'plot' throwing away 90% of the power?" Huh? What
would you like to substitute? I don't know what you might be writing,
but I am writing *games*. My comment about the Oz Project was only
half in jest -- they are trying to build more "plotless" IF,
concentrating on the world rather than a contrived "story". But the
original question as I read it was about writing IF GAMES. A game has
to be enjoyable. It has to have a reason for exisiting. It has to
have a goal, it has to have conflict, it has to have resolution. It
can't just sit there.
> Discussion question: Why do not-interactive stories have plots anyways?
> (Aside from a little bit of experimental fiction that does not)
>
> It's because the linear nature of the print medium forces a rigid,
> unchangeable sequence. Following a protagonist's experience
> chronologically is an obvious way of organizing this sequence.
>
> IF has no such limit, so why force a plot on it? Is the motivation
> simply to make a player explore your entire creation?
What are you going to substitute for plot? Answer me that. In a
multi-user environment, the interactions among players are more than
enough for a stimulating experience. In a one-player format, however,
there is no such interaction with other humans, and so there needs to
be something for the player to *do*.
I could write the biggest IF "game" you ever
saw -- ten thousand locations, simulating the city of Bowling Green.
I'll put in all the stores, people, and places in the city, accurate
as much as I can make it. It will be almost exactly like taking a
trip around the city, completely undirected by the author. You want
to ride on the bus? No prob. You want to go to Kmart? No prob. You
want to visit WKU and see me typing away in the computer lab when I
should be working? There I am. Yippee skippy. Big deal. You know
what I would do if I got into a program like that? I'd wander around
wondering what I was supposed to be doing here. I don't want to take
interactive "tours" of someone's world. That's BORING. I'm talking
about entertainment here. And as far as I'm concerned, simply "being
there" is not enough.
> As an amateur writer, I can tell you that stories may come out like
> that, but they don't go in like that. You (or at least I) start out with
> a setting, atmosphere, motivation for the character(s), possibly a few
> other characters (NPC's), climax to aim for, et.al. But IMO a story that
> knows in any great detail where it is going comes off as forced.
You seem to confuse the separate issues of writing and implementation.
My whole point is that the implementation of an IF game just takes a
story and translates it into a form that can be "experienced" by the
player. The whole purpose of my post and my comments was to
illustrate the fact that the vast majority of the "writing" is
separate from the vast majority of the "coding". And yes, some things
are going to be forced. It's called limitations of the hardware and
limits to the desire of the author to provide for every whim of the
player. Just because my game is set on Earth doesn't mean I want to
write a section to cover what happens if the player gets a wild hair
up his ass and decides he wants to move to Madagascar and farm goats.
In my opinion, a story that doesn't know where it is going comes off
as directionless and pointless. The player doesn't need to know what
he's going to see next -- and he shouldn't, otherwise there is no
suspense. The player should not know what the consequences of his
actions will be in advance, or there is no drama. The player should
be able to determine his goals, and be able to fulfill them in a
variety of ways, or there is no reward. In some cases, the player
might even be allowed to define his own goals.
The simple fact is that an "unlimited story machine" has not been
created. Once it is, I'm all for plopping the player down in a vast
world and letting him make of it what he will. Maybe he'll become a
rich merchant, or rise to great political power, or become a famous
gladiator. But such a machine, such an environment, does not exist
and will not exist for some time. In the absence of utter freedom, we
must substitute our own stories, our own goals, or there will be
nothing for the player to do. We must restrict the subset of possible
actions because we cannot provide for all possible actions. The only
logical way to make this restriction bearable that I have seen is to
give the player a good reason to play along with what we want: i.e.,
to advance the story and find out the resolution.
> All these things, setting, atmosphere, motivation, et al. can be used in
> IF without a forced sequence.
Give me an example game that doesn't force a single action on the
player. Show me a game where no puzzle precedes another puzzle, no
character knows information that any other character needs to know or
that the player needs to know. Show me a game that doesn't require
one thing to precede another thing. Will the rescue of the princess
come before her kidnapping? Show me a plotless game that is fun to
play, and I'll consider the merit of what you say.
> So in summary, *why* use the print device of plot?
To make a game a *game*, you have to provide a framework around which
the story will be constructed. Stories that do not progress in linear
order, or some variant thereof, are not coherent and therefore not
enjoyable. The linearity of the plot should be disguised as much as
possible; multiple plotlines should be made available; as much
freedom as possible should be allowed, but in the end the player must
try and fulfill the conditions of the story, or there is no game. And
to write a game that will be at all enjoyable, you (the author) must
know what the story is going to be before you start coding. That sums
up my posting and my opinion. I am more than willing to listen to any
other viewpoints, however, and you do raise a few interesting points.
Tom O Breton
> I, for one, never said anything about writing up a plotline. But, take this
> (backwards-written) example as to why plotlines exist in IF:
> I have a planet, and on this planet is a wrecked ship. How do I get players
> to find what I have waiting for them onboard?
First, why? This isn't rhetorical.
Is it the only location-complex in the game? Obviously start on or near
it.
Are you trying to make sure the players experience this particular part
of your creation? Make it accessible and known, and required to complete
the game. (Under whatever completion condition you have set up)
Or is it an optional part of the game? As above but drop it as a
requirement to complete the game.
If one thinks in terms of plot, one is tempted to "solve" it as a string
of now-they-do-this, now-they-do-that scenes. I think that's working
against the medium.
> Okay, they have to know where this planet is, right? And how do I get them
> to want to find out where the planet is?
> I plant a rumor seed on board the station that the crashed vessel
> originated from.
The only problem is if that is the only way to get there. Or what's
almost the same thing, to know there is such a place to go to.
It's suitable for a book-protagonist, 'cause the inflexible medium only
needs, and only allows, one way of doing a thing (That's one way
*per time the thing is done*.)
An IF story is more flexible, and could have any number of hints, from 0
(for a throwaway location of marginal interest) on up.
Stephen R. Granade
In some ways, these discussions of how to write an IF game are reminiscent
of similar discussions about how to write fiction. Everyone seems to
have differing approaches, any of which are capable of turning out
good games.
Having said that, I'm now going to throw in my method of writing IF. :)
I start with a basic, overarching goal. A game has to have a goal, or
it degenerates into a series of puzzles devoid of meaning. I know what
I want the player to end up doing in the end.
From there, things branch out quickly. I try to force myself to work on
locations first, since much of the atmosphere of the game will
come from them. However, when I begin working on them, puzzles and
objects begin to suggest themselves. WRITE EVERYTHING DOWN! Whatever
you do, do not not not assume that you'll remember all of your clever
puzzles a few days later.
I tend to spend a lot of time getting the "feel" of the locations right.
I am a big proponent of keeping games simple, in terms of rooms and
objects. Too many of either can make the game boring, or give the player
option paralysis. Every object you design will have infinite uses that
players will dream up. By all means describe everything, but don't go
overboard with objects to play with.
I like to have at least one "gee-whiz" object. For example,
the thing your aunt gave you from Hitchhiker's Guide. It gives players
something with which to play. :)
The rest of my process is similar to others'. Debug parts at a time,
code and recode, debug some more, etc. etc. ad nauseum.
Get some other people to play your game. Twist their arms. They'll
try things you never thought to cover.
That's about it. Comments and suggestions are welcome.
Stephen
--
_________________________________________________________________________
| Stephen Granade | "My research proposal involves reconstructing |
| | the Trinity test using tweezers and |
| sgra...@obu.arknet.edu | assistants with very good eyesight." |
William S Reilly
|> My comment about the Oz Project was only
|> half in jest -- they are trying to build more "plotless" IF,
|> concentrating on the world rather than a contrived "story".
You seem to have gotten a mistaken view of what the Oz project is
doing. We are very much interested in creating interactive stories
that have plots. In fact, we are hoping to create worlds with more
plot than exists in much current IF work. For example, forcing a
player to solve a sequence of puzzles each of which allows the
completion of the next puzzle is OK, but a plot that has a shape
similar to that of a typical novel (rising action leading to a climax
followed by a relaxing of tension) and that is driven by interactions
with interesting characters instead of physical puzzles seems like it
would be much more interesting.
Our work in this area is still very much in progress. The plot of
most Oz worlds is currently either enforced by the physical world (as
is the case in all current IF that I am aware of(*)) or does not exist.
The worlds without plots have been designed for demo purposes, so that
we can show off other aspects of the project (in particular, our work
in creating interesting characters) but are not supposed to represent
our final goal. One goal for our next demo system is to take advantage
of some of the work in plot that has been done so far.
Oh, I agree with pretty much everything else you have said in this
discussion concerning plot in IF!
Scott
(*) What I mean when I say that plot is enforced by the physical world
is that the ordering of events/scenes is (partially) ordered by elements
of the physical environment. These elements can include characters as
well as object-based puzzles. Our goal is to have a separate system that
has an explicit notion of the story's plot and what makes a good experience
for a player and then have this system make subtle adjustments to the
world as necessary to keep the player having an interesting experience.
These adjustments to the world could include things like: moving an
important object when the player isn't looking to make it more likely to
be found, changing the goal another character is pursuing, or even changing
the way a room is described to highten tension or to draw attention to a
particular object in the room.
Tom O Breton
> Do you think a game like _Trinity_ was written slapdash, with no idea
> of plot?
You seem convinced that that is synonymous. IMO the two have little to
do with each other.
> What I mean is that if you don't know what kind of game you want to
> write and what you want the story to be about before you start writing,
There is obviously some great semantic confusion here, because I
wouldn't call either of those elements "plot". To me they are named
"genre" and "theme". (This is established usage in literature.)
> "Isn't having a 'plot' throwing away 90% of the power?" Huh? What
> would you like to substitute?
and again
> What are you going to substitute for plot? Answer me that.
This seems to be a continuing assumption of yours, and frankly I can't
make head or tail out of it. Why would I substitute anything at all for
it? In an interactive medium, IMO it's an unhelpful, if not backwards,
technique. Why should I substitute another way of "puppetizing" the
player?
In summary: We are obviously not talking about the same thing.
I already made clear what I'm talking about and it's consonant with the
way the terms are generally used in literary criticism. So how about
telling me what you're talking about?
Gerry Kevin Wilson
mother of all IF. Since your game has no specific direction in mind, you
are going to have to cover every base. And you know what that means? Yup,
infinite work with diminishing returns. Have fun, and let me know when you
go out of business. You aren't going to get more than $60 for any game, no
matter how advanced or huge it is, unless your company has a huge reputation.
Even Origin can barely swing the $60-70 range, many people just get
disgusted at them and stop buying Ultima. Maybe you're just a great guy,
willing to do this incredible new generation of IF as a service to mankind,
but well, I'm not. Therefore, I will continue to use plot and storyline to
help narrow my focus down to the point where I can maybe show a profit for
my work. What you are describing has been discussed here many times in one
form or another. It's a matter of simulation vs. game. When you let the
player do anything he feels like, then you've got to program everything
conceivable into your program. Take for example, an ice cream cone.
smell cone, eat cone, bite cone, suck cone, squeeze cone, balance cone on
nose, wear cone on head, put cone in armpit, etc.
Plot is what's known as a diversionary tactic. The idea is to get the player
so engrossed in a great story that he doesn't mind the limitations so much.
Frankly, I don't believe that there will ever be anything like you describe,
because it would have to simulate the sum total of the human imagination
and experience. Anything I could imagine doing in a city (or jungle, or
whatever) has got to be programmed in. Or, maybe you didn't want to go that
far...perhaps you meant to just leave the specific plot out of the game
and make a setting with people and objects and let the player loose. But,
now that the player is wandering around with no goal in sight, no offer of
a reward or challenge, and finds, to his disgust, that he can't balance an
ice cream cone on his nose, what do you think he's going to do? He's going
to quit, and trash your game. If you've ever seen an Infocom player at it,
the muttering goes like this:
"Hmm, gotta get past the troll, gotta get past...throw bag at troll, he ate
it, cool! Hmm...rush past troll, grr, didn't work, gotta get past, kill
troll, aha! <cheer>"
Now your simulation:
"Hmm, an ice cream cone. What'll I do with it? I'll balance it on my nose.
Cool, it worked! Ok, now, what's the point here, I want something to do. I
want a Big Nasty (tm) to squish with my ice cream cone. Oh look, the
villagers are going about their lives, how quaint. Gee, this reminds me a
lot of a MUD, only I'm the only one around. I'm bored. <click>"
You see my theoretical point? What you would be making is a wonderful
virtual reality tour. Great. I'm sure there will be a future for you with
all the other people who worship William Gibson, wear microchips, and think
that 'cyberspace' is a really cool word. I just happen to prefer a game
with a purpose, a goal. It gives me more of an emotional high to write, and
it will wring more out of a player than any tour ever will. So go ahead,
don't plot. But don't tell me how silly it is to create a work of art with
a purpose and meaning behind it. Don't tell me that I should transcend
beyond my petty plots simply because you're in the mood to play tour guide.
Someday I may eat these words, and tour programs will be all the rage, but
somehow, I think that we'll stick with the good old story. After all, it has
been around as long as we could write, and before that, around the campfires
of a nomadic tribe. So you do what you want, I'm going to put my player on
strings, and make him grin. Really, 90% of the power of IF is simply that
we love to project ourselves into our favorite stories and novels, and IF
lets us step into the adventure. That doesn't mean we want the adventure
taken away from us.
--
<~~~~~E~~~G~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~|~~~~~~~>
< V R I O Software. We don't make games, we create worlds! | ~~\ >
< T | /~\ | >
<_WATCH for Avalon in early '94!____wh...@uclink.berkeley.edu_|_\__/__>
Tom O Breton
> Since your game has no specific direction in mind,
What on earth are you talking about? Sounds like you're jumping to
conclusions and then attacking your own conclusions.
Enough of this. I didn't post just to have my words twisted. I am sure
those who can benefit from my insight have already done so from the one
message. And to those of you who are religiously attached to plot as an
IF authoring device, I am sorry for this blow to your belief structure;
you will just have to bear with it.
Jacob Solomon Weinstein
>I have this sinking feeling that the IF I would really
>enjoy simply isn't out there yet. As someone said in a previous post, the
>IF version of Waiting For Godot is extremely popular. It seems to me that
>if someone had written 'the real thing', they would be smart enough to
>release a public domain teaser-demo, but I'm yet to see it.
I'm not sure what you mean by "the real thing," but I HAVE written an
IF version of Waiting for Godot. It should be available at
ftp.gmd.de--it's called Modernism. Take a look if you haven't seen it.
You'll find it as /if-archive/games/mac/Modernism.sit.hqx.
If folks would like, I can upload it as a .gam file so you can play it
on non-mac systems.
I ought to warn you--it's not much more exciting than the actual
play...
Jason Hutchens
forward. However, this doesn't mean that the IF becomes a
"Virtual Reality" tour with no overall goals. Such an ambitious
system should establish a series of goals, but with no overall
plot to dictate how the user should achieve these goals. The
system would alter the world in real-time to guide the user
towards the goal while still ensuring their total freedom of
movement. I would liken such a system to D&D.
When we play D&D, and we decide to go off on some totally
unrelated path that the DM hasn't accounted for, he/she can
alter the map or the goal to continue the story that we have
created for ourselves. The ultimate IF would be able to do this.
(Please realise that I am only dreaming, I am not suggesting that
someone should try and program such a thing).
- JA5! ;^)
Robert Paige Rendell
>mol...@wkuvx1.wku.edu (Molley the Mage) writes:
>> What I mean is that if you don't know what kind of game you want to
>> write and what you want the story to be about before you start writing,
>There is obviously some great semantic confusion here, because I
>wouldn't call either of those elements "plot". To me they are named
>"genre" and "theme". (This is established usage in literature.)
>In summary: We are obviously not talking about the same thing.
Ok, so there appears to have a confusion of terms here... Not being
of a particularly literary bent myself, I've had to infer what people
mean when they use the word "plot".
As far as I can see, Tom Breton uses the word "plot" to mean the thread
of storyline from start to end, for example, in describing the plot of
a movie to a friend, when you say "and then they went there and
such-and-such found a thingo that meant that the first guy..." etc
Molly the Mage seems to use the word "plot" to mean a broader outline of
the potential story... perhaps saying that the plot is what's happening
in the world that the player has to interact with, such as what the
villian is doing, where the disabled spacecraft is heading, what the
disease the main character has does to him or her...
So, if I can use these two definitions to reiterate the discussion so far,
Tom said that setting down a "plot" loses you 90% of the charm of IF, i.e.
saying that the player must do this, then that, then go and meet X, etc.
In other words, you don't want a highly linear game, where the player only
has one "correct" choice at every point. As Graham Nelson, author of
_inform_, said in his "Bill of Players Rights" in the inform manual:
} After a while the player begins
} to feel that the designer has tied him to a chair in order to shout the
} plot at him.
(oops, that p-word again :)
Then, Molly the Mage, using his definition of the word "plot", said "if you
take away the plot", (i.e. the general direction you want the player to go,
and what's going on in the world that the player should react to,) "you end
up with a goal-less simulation, which is infeasible to write and not very
enjoyable to play in."
So, I don't think there's an actual difference of opinions here, only a
difference of interpretation...
... and I agree with both of you, I don't want to play a linear story (unless
it's particularly engrossing, in which case, I could have just read it as a
novel :), and I don't want to play a goal-less simulation (well, maybe for a
while, if someone could write one ;)
I hope I haven't put words in the mouths of Tom or Molly, or at least, if I
have, they fit what they were saying anyway.
--
Robert Rendell \((/
ren...@molly.cs.monash.edu.au ~oo~
What do you know about Tweetle beetles? Well... /))\
Jason Noble
Whew! Go Molley go!
Michael Booth
>In my opinion, having no strict plot would be a great step
>forward. However, this doesn't mean that the IF becomes a
>"Virtual Reality" tour with no overall goals. Such an ambitious
>system should establish a series of goals, but with no overall
>plot to dictate how the user should achieve these goals. The
>system would alter the world in real-time to guide the user
>towards the goal while still ensuring their total freedom of
>movement. I would liken such a system to D&D.
>
An even more interesting extension to a 'simulation' IF system would be
having the NPCs 'come up' with new plots of their own. Note this doesn't
mean having Turing-complete AI creatures, but some method of recombining
'interesting' goals into pseudo new ones, perhaps depending on certain
circumstances (King dies, court magician adds 'take over kingdom' to his/her
goal list, if he/she is 'evil').
In my opinion, 'simulation' does not have to recreate life, the universe,
and everything, but should handle some decent subset of things, and allow
the user to sufficiently suspend his/her disbelief. Clever code can go a
long way in this regard (ok, more clever than a few hacks, yes). Either way,
as long as the world is consistent, then the user must merely adapt to
a slightly differing reality. Most of my interest at this point is in
multi-user network games (MUD-like things), where many people are in the
same environment. I believe a simulated environment to be the way to go there.
In addition, having a number of NPCs interacting, even in a limited way,
creates a more in-depth environment than the sum of its parts. If these NPCs
can exchange information and make simple inferences, very interesting things
could happen. At the very least, the world would have alot of atmosphere.
Mike
--
--===| Michael S. Booth (bo...@ccad.uiowa.edu) |===--
---===| Virtual Environments Group, Scenario Control Subsystem |===---
--===| Iowa Driving Simulator, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA |===--
Molley the Mage
As before, >> represent my comments, > Tom's replies.
>> Do you think a game like _Trinity_ was written slapdash, with no idea
>> of plot?
>
> You seem convinced that that is synonymous. IMO the two have little to
> do with each other.
That "what" is synonymous? I'm confused about what you are referring
to here. If you mean do I believe that "plot" and "game" are
synonymous, then in this case I would say yes. I think I made that
quite clear with the rest of my post :-). If you are referring to two
other entities, then please clarify and I'll address them.
>> What I mean is that if you don't know what kind of game you want to
>> write and what you want the story to be about before you start writing,
>
> There is obviously some great semantic confusion here, because I
> wouldn't call either of those elements "plot". To me they are named
> "genre" and "theme". (This is established usage in literature.)
I disagree entirely. If you wish to precisely delineate between
"plot", that is to say the events which unfold in the story (ie rising
and falling action, etc) and "genre" (ie the medium or mythos) and
"theme" (ie the purpose, moral, meaning, or message) then I'll be
happy to amend my statement to read: If you don't know what genre you
want your story to take place in, you don't have a theme for the
story, *and* you don't have some ideas about the plot, before you
start writing, then you will probably end up with a directionless work
that will not be enjoyable to play.
This is stricly IMO, going on my assumption that we are both talking
about writing *games*. I don't believe that IF *games* which do not
follow the paradigm I have been discussing in my posts and which
contain elements of traditional fiction such as plot have been written
or would be enjoyable to play at the current state of the art.
(_Waiting for Godot_ excepted).
>> "Isn't having a 'plot' throwing away 90% of the power?" Huh? What
>> would you like to substitute?
>
> and again
>
>> What are you going to substitute for plot? Answer me that.
>
> This seems to be a continuing assumption of yours, and frankly I can't
> make head or tail out of it. Why would I substitute anything at all for
> it? In an interactive medium, IMO it's an unhelpful, if not backwards,
> technique. Why should I substitute another way of "puppetizing" the
> player?
What you refer to as "puppetizing" the player I refer to as making a
concession to REALITY. Not the "suspension of disbelief" or the
"reality" of the story world, but rather the simple fact that you
can't NOT puppetize the player and have a workable program. Describe
a method for successfully implementing the type of IF you are talking
about. Theory and "wishing" are great, but I live in the present, not
the future. I want to have goals which I can actually realize.
>
> In summary: We are obviously not talking about the same thing.
>
> I already made clear what I'm talking about and it's consonant with the
> way the terms are generally used in literary criticism. So how about
> telling me what you're talking about?
Literary criticism???? You just spent two postings arguing that
literary constraints should be ignored and/or dropped. I agree,
however, that we are not talking about the same thing. I reiterate:
The very first post which I responded to asked a question about how to
write an IF game. I assumed that this person was talking about a game
in the style of traditional IF (ie Infocom) and gave my thoughts on
the subject. You asserted that "plot" in a game of this type was a
bad idea, and I have been disputing that assertion, because I don't
believe that "plotless" IF of the type you are talking about (which I
assume is the type that gives the player limitless freedom, correct me
if I am wrong please) CANNOT BE WRITTEN AT THIS TIME.
Once again, if I am confused about your goals please correct me. I
re-state that my goal is to create *games* which are to be enjoyed by
the player, and I believe that to do this at this time (lacking a
Universal Story Machine and a good consistent simulation of a complete
world) you cannot even *try* to give the player "total freedom"
because you cannot. Instead, you must provide a story for the player
to follow: the PLOT. If you have successfully implemented a game
which does not use plot, PLEASE tell me where to get a copy and I will
gladly play it and give you my opinion. I don't think such a bird
exists, however, and that is my whole point.
This, has, however, been an interesting and entertaining discussion,
and hopefully has given some people a few insights into differing
styles of literary thought :-)
Sean
--
M. Sean Molley, CS Department, Western Kentucky University, Bowling Green, KY
RealSpace : (502) 745-4027 | Email: mol...@wkuvx1.wku.edu | Life : Sucks
--
You don't know about Grammar Day? It's a holiday for English teachers.
The government funds it with its syntax, and the weather is pluperfect.
--
Narciso Jaramillo
there are probably interesting discussions somewhere along the
continuum.
The "plot required" endpoint is taken by its opponents to mean that
the game must force the character to go through a precise sequence of
actions. The "plot not required" endpoint is taken by its opponents
to mean that there are absolutely no goals or motivations--viz.,
wandering around in a simulation. Somehow I doubt that the proponents
of either of these views are suggesting these ad-absurdum
characterizations.
Although it may currently be impossible to create a simulation with
enough detail to allow goals or motivations to emerge completely
automatically, I think there's still room for growth beyond Molley's
description of IF game structure based on a single story/plot/goal.
For instance, one might construct a game in which there are several
different--possibly mutually exclusive--ultimate goals.
Here's a simple example. The player starts out as a minor government
official in a town that's fallen on hard economic times. The player
is then presented with an opportunity to run for mayor. At this
point, the player might be approached by some shady characters who
offer to help her get elected. The player finds out that there are
many corrupt officials in government, stealing public money and giving
the Mafia special favors.
After getting elected, the player's goal might be to follow her fellow
official's examples--to steal as much money as possible without
getting caught; perhaps she could even blackmail the other politicos,
while still dipping into the till herself. Then, at some point,
the heat would be on, and she could retire to Brazil under an assumed
identity. This would be a "win".
On the other hand, the player might try to clean up the government by
ferretting out the corrupt officials, exposing them to the public.
This would also be a "win", though a completely different one.
Or the player might blackmail her fellow officials, and get money from
them, then expose them anyway--winning the admiration of the public
(which doesn't know he's been blackmailing them). But then they might
get angry and have their Mafioso friends attack her, etc. If she
survived, she could get reelected--another "win"--assuming that she
didn't make any mistakes that would allow someone else to expose
her...
Note that much of the game machinery will automatically support these
different goals. Obviously, all the rooms, physical objects, etc. are
the same. Some of the subgoals are the same--getting elected, finding
out incriminating information about other officials, etc. But because
the player's ultimate aim is different in each case, the way the
player uses the information he gets or the objects she encounters will
be different. The game author has to expand the game universe
somewhat over a traditional single-plot game--but no "complete
simulation" is required; just some extra creativity.
You might even have a few limited NPCs around, to take the place of
the player in the paths the player doesn't follow. For example, both
the player and an NPC opponent get elected to the city council. If
the player doesn't build ties to the Mafia, perhaps the NPC will,
becoming the "evil" character, and trying to thwart the player's
goody-two-shoes-ness. On the other hand, if the player does build
ties to the Mafia, perhaps the NPC will become a "good" character,
trying to get evidence on the player's dealings in order to expose
her. Note that the NPC doesn't actually have to "do" all the things
that the player would do if the roles are reversed; the NPC is just a
game construct, so it can "cheat", and take advantage of the player's
mistakes directly. (Of course, the NPC still has to be regulated for
playability.)
I haven't seen any games that have this kind of structure. There are
some IF games that have multiple endings, but usually there's only one
"best" ending, and the others are less than ideal somehow. In the
kind of structure I'm talking about, all the different goals are
equally satisfying. Thus, although there's still a limited range of
potential goals, they're now partly emergent from the situations the
player finds herself in, so the player has more control over what she
wants to achieve in the game.
nj
Tom O Breton
> As far as I can see, Tom Breton uses the word "plot" to mean the
> thread of storyline from start to end, for example, in describing the
> plot of a movie to a friend, when you say "and then they went there
> and such-and-such found a thingo that meant that the first guy..." etc
Very good. I'd only add that:
* your high school English teacher will probably have defined it
similarly.
* For the sake of a complete definition I'm excluding basic game
mechanics. (EG: "First unlock the door, then open it, then go through"
is not plot.)
> So, if I can use these two definitions to reiterate the discussion so
> far, Tom said that setting down a "plot" loses you 90% of the charm of
> IF, i.e. saying that the player must do this, then that, then go and
> meet X, etc. In other words, you don't want a highly linear game, where
> the player only has one "correct" choice at every point.
Yes. Except that I'd say even a moderately linear game could loosen up
and let the player drive more. (Excluding consciously-created puzzles,
of course.)
> I hope I haven't put words in the mouths of Tom or Molly, or at least,
> if I have, they fit what they were saying anyway.
You did good. }:)
Tom O Breton
> That "what" is synonymous? I'm confused about what you are referring
> to here.
You equated not having a plot with being a "slap-dash" game.
> If you mean do I believe that "plot" and "game" are synonymous, then in
> this case I would say yes. I think I made that quite clear with the
> rest of my post :-).
IMO that speaks for itself. We are not speaking the same language.
> Literary criticism???? You just spent two postings arguing that
> literary constraints should be ignored and/or dropped.
You keep twisting my words like that. I don't know what you hope to gain
by doing that. You also totally ignored my definition of plot, which you
also should have remembered from English class. I don't think you're
interested in actual communication.
It's unpleasant for me and it derails discussion, and I don't want to
continue a discussion on those terms.
Tom O Breton
[etc.]
I like your example.
> I haven't seen any games that have this kind of structure. There are
> some IF games that have multiple endings, but usually there's only one
> "best" ending, and the others are less than ideal somehow.
That does seem to be common.
> The "plot required" endpoint is taken by its opponents to mean that
> the game must force the character to go through a precise sequence of
> actions.
My point must have gotten distorted in the noise. I'm not simply
objecting to a total 100% re-enactment; I think re-enacting a plot
should be minimized.
Mikael Kindborg
(Interesting thoughts (IMO) on IF deleted)
>enjoy simply isn't out there yet. As someone said in a previous post, the
>IF version of Waiting For Godot is extremely popular. It seems to me that
>if someone had written 'the real thing', they would be smart enough to
>release a public domain teaser-demo, but I'm yet to see it.
I am sorry if I have missed something here, but I would be most
interested in a summary of the interactive version of Waiting
for Godot. What is it like? What is the role of the player?
What is it that is interactive? Who sells it? How much does
it cost?
I have read several of Beckett's shorter plays, and they are
often really good and imaginative. Any thoughts on simulating
plays like this? Is Waiting for Godot a simulation or is it a
branched type of thing.
Mikael Kindborg
email: nat...@nada.kth.se
Jason Noble
I'm sorry about the confusion I have generated with a throwaway line about
Waiting for Godot. I think Molley said originally that "the IF version of
Waiting For Godot is extrememly popular", and I repeated it because I
thought it was an amusing comment on many boring IF games that had few people
/ actors in them and no clear goals for the player.
However, I was not referring to an actual simulation of the Beckett (sp?)
play. As much as I like the play, I cannot believe there's anyone out there
who really wants to play the IF version, but each to their own I suppose.
Jacob Solomon Weinstein (didn't he write Save Princeton?) posted something
about 15 articles back saying that he had in fact written an IF version of
WfG for the Mac. It is at ftp.gmd.de, if-archive/games/mac/modernism. [can't
remember file suffixes but this should be close enough to find it anyway; the
name is modernism.something or other].
Again, my apologies for the confusion. I should have made it clear that I
was taking the piss.
I hope you enjoy the game.
Joseph Bates
A recent post suggested that the Oz project is trying to build
plotless worlds. To the best of my knowledge, this is not the
case. Oz considers the long term structure of an experience
(ie, plot or story) to be of great importance, and emphasizes
this along with characters and effective presentation style
in its research. This view is summarized in a paper called
"Virtual Reality, Art, and Entertainment" that appeared in
the first issue of PRESENCE, a journal from MIT Press.
Joe Bates