Thursday, December 1, 2011

Oh man, this is fantastic.


Tom Francis, game journalist extraordinaire and fledgling indie game dev, has been working on Gunpoint for a while now; I've had a chance to play the beta, it's definitely something special. He already put out a call for artist volunteers, and got some amazing results (as you can see).

A couple days back he put out a similar query for any interested composers, including a gameplay video people could pair their tentative soundtracks too. And once again, he's getting a pile of great responses- check out the comments on this page and hear it for yourself.

I'm just floored by how much good ambient music enhances this game's atmosphere. It's really something.

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Tuesday, July 19, 2011

Paratopian City (Part 2)


"Paratopian." Neither uptopia nor dystopia; something beyond the bounds of what you'd ever see in a "normal" society.

(8:15:22 PM) Dagda: Gotham's not really a representative sample anymore, but I'm still after that interesting "metanormals & normals who've adapted" dynamic.
(8:15:53 PM) Dagda: The city tends to have its own way of doing things, on every level.
(8:15:56 PM) Sylvia Viridian: Yeah, I like the idea of it
(8:16:04 PM) Dagda: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kGyVZRHZ2ow is another inspiration here
(8:16:44 PM) Dagda: (I have very little interest in actually playing that game, but HNNNGH that concept and aesthetic are amazing)
(8:16:53 PM) Sylvia Viridian: That is very pretty
(8:17:51 PM) Dagda: Final Fantasy, plus Kingdom Hearts, plus modern day upper-class urban society, plus the mafia? V Yes.
(8:17:58 PM) Sylvia Viridian: Oh, yes
(8:18:07 PM) Sylvia Viridian: Very, very shiny
(8:18:32 PM) Dagda: Gonna actually get into the next bit, feel free to keep watching & read later
(8:18:44 PM) Sylvia Viridian: oh, okay
(8:19:15 PM) Dagda: Basically, I'm thinking that for every protagonist/PC who's a paranormal being, there'll be 2 humans.
(8:21:21 PM) Dagda: One of whom is just skilled- skills meaning all the sorts of things we see Jason Bourne get up to. The ability to break in & infiltrate urban environments, fight with guns or martial arts, escape & evasion, taking on & subverting institutions. . .and awesome chase sequences, natch.
(8:22:28 PM) Dagda: The other one? Well, they're human, but honestly it's a stretch to call them "normal"
(8:23:53 PM) Dagda: A paranormal person can't teach a human to use magic. But some humans are. . .sensitive to a particular class of supernatural being.
(8:25:39 PM) Dagda: Sustained exposure can trigger physiological changes, giving someone one of several "conditions" based on which type of beign they're sensitive too. Their paranormal natures rub off on us, but in a more grounded sci-fi way.
(8:25:55 PM) Sylvia Viridian: I see~ Interesting
(8:26:58 PM) Dagda: An inspiration that comes in here is an anime called Canaan, which is pretty amazing for about 2-3 episodes (and then runs out of steam)
(8:27:49 PM) Dagda: It has several characters who have abnormal nervous systems, giving them a sort of savant-esque synesthesia with a side order of bullet time
(8:28:59 PM) Dagda: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0o06weVt9j0 <-Best example occurs at about 19 minutes in
(8:29:34 PM) Sylvia Viridian: /watches (8:31:11 PM) Sylvia Viridian: I see, cool
(8:31:39 PM) Dagda: So yeah, ripping that off
(8:33:02 PM) Dagda: Will probably have the reflexes and synesthesia perception be two separate things, but hey
(8:35:14 PM) Dagda: Other options would be someone who's empathic to a degree that's clearly ESP (i.e. they feel what someone else is feeling even though they're in another room or something), or someone who can do adrenaline-fuled, mother-lifts-minivan-off-kid feats of strength almost at will (regardless of the terrible strain it puts on their bodies).
(8:35:54 PM) Dagda: All things you can theoretically imagine as being within the realm of human potential
(8:35:59 PM) Sylvia Viridian: Yeah
(8:36:48 PM) Dagda: So yeah. There's about one other key thing I've figured out that I should mention.
(8:40:36 PM) Dagda: The Gotham Central-inspired police, the ones that "have their own way of doing things", that have their share of corruption and abuse but by & large are made up of decent, pragmatic human beings? The ones who go out and walk/drive their beats, keep the peace, know the guys on the street corner by name? There are limits to their authority.
(8:41:36 PM) Sylvia Viridian: Oh, that sounds ominous
(8:45:10 PM) Dagda: The border guard, the ones in the helicopters and gunboats- originally a PMC that was contracted in the 70s, reports directly to the federal authority? They're active in the city, too. They're the ones in black helmets who do immigration raids, break up protests & riots (& claim they were riots either way), and do their best to hunt down the players (who are either part of the underworld or deal with it enough that they could wind up in serious trouble)
(8:45:21 PM) Dagda: This is that Mirror's Edge influence coming in.
(8:45:30 PM) Sylvia Viridian: Gotcha
(8:45:55 PM) Sylvia Viridian: So the cops are decent guys, but there's also military type forces
(8:46:18 PM) Dagda: More or less.
(8:46:40 PM) Sylvia Viridian: Who are much less nice and understanding about the whole supernatural deal
(8:48:04 PM) Dagda: The peacekeepers are the equivalent of cops who'll go out and ask prostitutes if they recognize a woman who turned up dead. They know this stuff goes on and if someone's being blatant/stupid they'll do something about it, but it's the status quo.
(8:48:51 PM) Sylvia Viridian: Makes sense
(8:48:53 PM) Dagda: The enforcers, they're not exactly military- but they carry guns and will use them, no question on that.
(8:49:03 PM) Sylvia Viridian: Yeah
(8:49:30 PM) Dagda: They're "The Man", not to mention "La Migra".
(8:50:20 PM) Dagda: No engagement with the community, just a force that's not to be reckoned with. (Since if there's any reckoning going on they're the ones who're carrying it out)
(8:50:31 PM) Sylvia Viridian: Of course
(8:51:00 PM) Dagda: Now, 95% of them have no chance of matching the speed of a character with moderate parkour-type skills.
(8:51:17 PM) Dagda: (Which I'm thinking will be a significant portion of them)
(8:51:28 PM) Sylvia Viridian: It'd be a necessary survival skill
(8:51:31 PM) Sylvia Viridian: and also really really cool (8:51:53 PM) Dagda: Exactly!
(8:52:30 PM) Dagda: But they're still a serious threat, for one key reason: Coordination.
(8:52:54 PM) Sylvia Viridian: Right. Outrunning an individual doesn't mean as much when they have comms
(8:56:14 PM) Dagda: When you're being chased by enforcers, somewhere out there is a dispatcher- one of the ones with live access to every security camera in the city. And their career is going to be set back or forwards a good two years based on whether or not you get caught.
(8:56:32 PM) Sylvia Viridian: Aha.
(8:57:14 PM) Dagda: You had better believe they're going to throw everything they possibly can at you, on-duty or no.
(8:57:23 PM) Sylvia Viridian: Yes, indeed
(8:59:00 PM) Dagda: You're able to build up a good lead on your pursuers, cutting down one particular back alley and managing to get up over the edge of the rooftop right before the first of them rounds the corner.
(9:01:46 PM) Dagda: And then the maintenance doors on 3 different neighboring rooftops are kicked down simultaneously, and snipers are dashing out to take aim. The dispatcher's voice yells orders at you from the Public Announcement system, telling you you're dead if you so much as move a muscle.
(9:02:16 PM) Dagda: Looking back, that was the point where things really got interesting :P
(9:02:21 PM) Sylvia Viridian: lol
(9:02:23 PM) Sylvia Viridian: I like it!
(9:05:54 PM) Dagda: Since that delay gave the gang lord's men (the ones you'd been fighting in the first place, until the enforcers took notice) chance to catch up, and everything descended into chaos from there.

Image was done by this artist on pixiv.

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Paratopian City (Part 1)

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Thursday, May 19, 2011

Re: "Which Bite Wins"


Hmm.

It all depends on precisely which variety of each monster is being used. So let's start with the fundamentals.

PART 1: CONTRIVED BIOLOGICAL EXPLANATIONS
Zombies are caused by an actual virus, spread via bodily fluids. One explanation I always liked, from a few incarnations of Resident Evil, was that it was a combination of a destructive ebola strain (which would kill people too fast to actually spread) and a failed viral vector which stimulated cell growth & activity (they wanted supersoldiers, instead of mutated bodybuilders with lots and lots of cancer).

Vampirism is a disease, bloodborne microorganisms (think malaria) that alter your bodily chemistry to make you sociopathic, alert, unnaturally strong, oversensitive to light, in need of blood, etc.

Werewolves. . .hmm. Let's say that werewolves are a hereditary genetic thing- because genetic traits aren't always just recessive or dominant. There are disorders that run in a family but have little clear pattern, because the potential is there in the genes but other factors are needed to push you over the brink. Like your diet, or high levels of stress. High levels of stress. . .from being bitten by a werewolf.

Uh, and it has to be a werewolf because there's also a biochemical factor that's induced by a werewolf's saliva. (Werewolf french kisses will thus also induce a transformation, but they almost never do that to someone)


PART 2: INITIAL INFECTION
If we assume each of these transformations' initial effect happens over the effect of 5 minutes, what happens when they're combined? Here's where I really start throwing out bullcrap (instead of rigorously looking up concepts like "viral vectors" on wikipedia, for like 5 whole minutes, and *then* using them in my bullcrap).

The zombie virus is spreading throughout your bloodstream, altering the behavior of your body's cells so that they work 80-hour weeks with little oversight or direction. The effects would not be obvious right away- the subject would be feverish and delirious, with the viral vectors needing longer periods of time to reach the central nervous system.

The werewolf stimuli simultaneously triggers a change in the subject's. . .uh. . .he grows hair and stuff, ok? Look, this just getting ridicu{TECHNICAL DIFFICULTIES, PLEASE STAND BY}

Ahem. The werewolf stimuli simultaneously triggers its own change in the subject's biological functions, activating the latent potential behaviors of his organs. His body starts to reconfigure itself, with the viral zombie interference hindering the development in some cases and amplifying it in others.

The increase in pulse rate and vital activities would give the bloodborne vampire microorganisms a boost, letting them take effect quickly and with more potency. So while the subject begins having difficulty distinguishing reality from his imagination (the zombie virus' initial delirium), and having all kinds of predatory carnivore impulses, he's also becoming more alert, obsessive-compulsive, and sociopathically cunning.


PART 3: THE TRANSFORMATION
Soon the delirium will fade as the zombie virus reaches the brain, and the higher thought processes turn to empty static. But where a normal brain would thus be left in a constant state of dazed distraction and simple agitation, this brain has different kinds of things going on under the hood. Predatory impulses to hunt and prowl, to lurk and carefully monitor the surroundings, to lunge forward and attack your prey with terrible ferocity.

Physically, the subject's skin becomes pale and lifeless before it can grow much hair, and his terrified babbling quickly gives way to guttural groans and animal growls. The scientists high five one another as the subject flexes ineffectively against the restraints, concluding that they have basically produced a zombie with sharp teeth that snarls alot.

They aren't realizing how there are changes that are only just beginning in the subject's muscles. That they've started growing to fulfill their latent potential, AND have been told by viral vectors to work overtime, AND are being treated to a special biochemical cocktail courtesy of bloodborne symbiotic microorganisms. Meaning that in a few days the subject will become twice as strong. . .three times over. (That's right- EXPONENTIALLY stronger)

And because there's nothing else left for a zombie to feel; because it fuels everything the wolf has evolved to accomplish; because it defines the vampire by its all-consuming addiction: the subject will be driven by an unstoppable hunger for living human beings.

Howzat?

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Thursday, February 17, 2011

The Sins of Experience Points


This post on Ben Garney's blog led me into two interesting discussions, one in the comments for that post and the other on Google Buzz. Both seemed worth reposting here.

Dagda:
I have no problem believing that social games can be good/great, while still having viral and monetization elements that’re only minor detriments to the experience.

I can also easily believe many social game devs are passionate about what they do, innovative, and excited to be reaching out to a broader audience. That you and your colleagues/competitors are smart people (likely smarter than me), ones who’re seeking to use your powers for good.

I’m just not sure, on a case by case basis, that this is what’s actually happening. That the games you see as a Good Thing are adding something to the lives of those who play it, rather than just taking something away.

More precisely, what disturbs me is that the impression that so many social games seem to focus on providing is an artificial sense of accomplishment. Yes, Diablo and Torchlight also have this as their primary “gameplay”; frankly, I despise both of them. It reminds me of the japanese “dating sim” genre- sometimes those games provide fascinating stories and engaging gameplay that centers around interacting with well-realized NPCs. But many others are primarily meant as an artificial substitute for a relationship with an actual human being.

Put differently: My untested suspicion is that most social games are like mental junk food. I’m not about to call a bag of cheetos “evil”. But if both the people making cheetos and the people consuming them didn’t see a difference between their chosen food product and some fresh fruits and vegetables, would you start to feel concerned?

Ben Garney:
So, your metaphor is that traditional games (let’s say Civ 5, Madden, and Braid for example) are wholesome and filling, while social games are junk food?

Dagda:
Precisely, except that I’d insert a “many” in before “social games”. Nothing says they have to be that way, and I’m heartened that you’re seeing a trend towards deeper gameplay.

A more on-target way to put it might be that incentive systems (gold, leveling up) are like sugar and salt. A potent way to enhance a substantive core product, but make them the core and you’re left with something of a much shallower value. Is Farmville a game? Is a candy cane food?

Ben Garney:
That brings us to the core of the issue. I agree – most social games are really light on the gameplay. But that doesn’t makes them evil – it’s just a sign of an immature market. Little kids will take sweets over a fine steak dinner. But as they grow up and their palates mature, they begin to appreciate the finer things in life. We will see the same in the social space.

Of course, some people prefer candy canes to steak their whole life. I think some gamers come from a place where they are used to fine steak and can’t understand why anyone is interested in McDonalds.

----- And from Google Buzz:

Brooks Harrel - I wound up making the longer version of this comment on the blog itself, but: The thing about social games that worries me is when their design's primary goal is to provide an artificial sense of accomplishment. 'Games' like that, I see as mental junk food: Hardly "evil", but you'll still be worried if the manufacturers and consumers viewed it as no different from eating fresh fruits and vegetables.

(To be fair, a better analogue for a normal videogame would be a burger from a family restaurant. Not the healthiest choice, but it has actual nutritious value rather than just flavor, grease, and the ability to fill up your stomach.)

Daniel Cook - I look at our beloved RPGs and one of the primary design goals is to 'provide an artificial sense of accomplishment'. It is an old technique. I'm willing to make the judgement that current social games and traditional games have about the same inherent value if we can look past the happy glow of past memories.

One thing I like about social games is the idea that they are...social. Whether the current crop accomplish that or not is besides the point. They offer a chance to ask the question "How do we make our games more social? How do we build relationships with games?" And that is 100% awesome.

Brooks Harrel - Actually, I can't stand playing Diablo 2 or Torchlight either, because those are also games that try to make artificial accomplishments the "meat" of the gameplay. Meanwhile, I have no problem with the cash system in Steambirds Survival- because your incentive system is being used to enhance gameplay that'd be worthwhile in and of itself, and your "rewards" provide new varieties of challenges, rather than over powering the core gameplay.

Food analogies always serve me well when explaining my thoughts on games, so I'll fall back on the one I touched on above: In my mind, games are to food as incentives (gold, exp) are to sugar and salt. They serve to enhance the substance of the product, but the value they add is relatively shallow. Junk food- stuff a health-minded parent would refer to as "pure sugar/salt"- is hardly going to kill you, but you'll likely be better off if you consume it in moderation. And it hardly deserves the label of "food".

At any rate, I'll readily agree that social games are by no means inherently bad- another 100% awesome thing about them is the way they're advancing the field in terms of accessible (open and simple) design.

Casey Monroe - I was a big fan of Diablo 2, so I'm curious about your thoughts on that. What specifically would you say is the "meat" of gameplay there? It's been a little while, but I don't think any of my accomplishments in Diablo 2 felt "artificial"—they all seemed to flow naturally from the mechanics of the game.

Brooks Harrel - Mmm. It's been nearly a decade since I touched that game, so I don't trust my memory enough to stand by any in-depth critique; the following is all written with Torchlight in mind first and foremost.

I'll try to quickly and clearly define terms here. My definition for "game" is an interesting challenge you learn to overcome. When I talk about the "meat" of the gameplay, I'm talking about the deepest challenges- the ones with the most layers of mastery for your brain (and not your virtual avatar) to attain, whether it's on a high-concept level (crunching numbers in your head, mulling over which dialog option to choose while the game waits) or an instinctive one (recognizing an enemy, identifying which attack their behavior indicates they're about to make, and reflexively hitting the right button for making the right counter-move).

Torchlight doesn't have much meat. There's the long-term logistical challenge of amassing power, which in practice means basic inventory management (is Weapon A > Weapon B?), choosing the right build options (is Skill A > B, C and D?), and developing a thorough pack-rat's awareness so as not to miss any loot. And there's the short-term challenge of the combat- avoiding attacks, aiming your own attacks, using special abilities and consumables in the right time/place/fashion, adjusting your playstyle (i.e. basic tactics) to take better advantage of your character build. In practice, virtually all of these aspects have the depth of a kiddie pool. Meanwhile, Resident Evil 4 took all those same game elements and created one of the deepest single-player game experiences ever.

I call Torchlight "junk food" because it makes heavy use of artificial incentives not just as a slot-machine payoff (i.e. "skinner box" mechanism), but as an artificial substitute for mastery- like how fast-food burgers inject meat flavoring into thin slices of freeze-dried meat and paint grill marks on the patty. Like real mastery, you can dispatch once-fearsome enemies with ease and pull of amazing stunts- but how much of that is because of you, instead of your virtual avatar? (Put differently: how much can be lost due to a corrupt save file?)

As the consumer, you get a direct payoff (good flavor/good game flow) and tangible evidence of your accomplishment (full stomach/powerful character). But those aren't the only things that matter about food, nor the only things that matter about games.

P.S: For a specific examination & critique of Diablo 2's design, I advise checking out http://www.actionbutton.net/?p=518

Casey Monroe - Hmm...I'm not going to say I disagree with you, I think what you're describing is an indictment of the entire RPG genre though. It can be fairly said that I'm not significantly better at playing Mass Effect 2 or Final Fantasy at the end of the game experience than I am at the beginning. My character improves and becomes more powerful, but I don't become a significantly better player--or at least, that's not the focus.

I understand that this kind of game is not for everyone, to be sure. But for comparison, I adored Diablo 2 and found Resident Evil off-putting. Is that because I prefer junk food to healthy food? I'm not sure that's true.

Brooks Harrel - I'm condemning one of the core features of the RPG genre- or at least arguing we treat it less like a food group and more like salt, i.e. something to add flavor to the "real" game experience. Of course, "genre" in this context is just a standardized game design formula, one which has seen a distressingly low level of innovation. Resident Evil 4 (not to be confused with its survival-horror predecessors), Mass Effect 2, and Devil Survivor are all welcome exceptions to this trend, producing jaw-droppingly good results by holding themselves to a higher standard in terms of deep gameplay.

As for Diablo 2 vs. your experience with Resident Evil: If I have a choice between McDonalds and a family-owned mexican restaurant that makes all their stuff by hand from fresh ingredients, I'm likely to choose McDonalds. It's not as healthy, but I'm no gourmet and don't usually like mexican food. The important thing is to be aware that something is junk food and consume it accordingly.

Casey Monroe - To be honest, I didnt find ME2's gameplay to be exceptionally deep. Same with Diablo 2. I don't think it follows, however, that the game itself is correspondingly less deep. I think that the depth in games merely comes from other sources--sources like story, pacing, etc. These forms of depth are not unique to games, but are nonetheless valid.

Brooks Harrel - I think I was still using "game" in the "interesting challenge" sense, not the "video game" sense.

But taking your point on its own: Oh yes, I agree wholeheartedly. I'll take plenty of games to task for falling short in that area as well. An action-heavy fps can have a moving, branching-paths story; a plot-heavy RPG can have great gameplay. But your audience won't call you out if you fall short in those aspects, because the precedents set by your predecessors left a very low bar. (Wait- are you saying Diablo 2's true depth was in its narrative?)

It occurs to me that I've actually got more to offer on some of these discussion points than just talk. http://bit.ly/f79qsI is a core gameplay test build for a "scrolling shooter". The idea was to have a central part of the gameplay be the RPG mechanics that had the most gameplay "meat" to them, mainly loadout choices that noticeably affected the way you play.

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Thursday, February 3, 2011

Apple Farmer 3000!


I wound up with an great team for the 2011 Global Game Jam; you can enjoy fruits of our labors here. For now I'll just repost the description I wrote there, lest this post blossom into a constant string of terrible puns.

The game is a hotseat 2-player game with three factions: The organic apple farmer, the genetically modified apple farmer and the viral blackberries. It's designed so that play the game entirely by clicking on map tiles to perform context-sensitive actions.

-Each tile has numbers showing the rounds left until the lease expires (on the left) and the crop yields a profit (on the right). When the lease is down to 0, you’ll get the option to renew it.
-An apple crop on a tile with Fertility 10 makes 100% of the maximum profit ($20). On a tile with Fertility 5, the profit would be 50% of the maximum ($10).

-It costs $8 to lease a tile for 10 turns, $5 to clear plants from a tile you own, and $5 to plant a crop. Organic crops take 5 rounds to yield a profit; GMO crops only need 4.
-On the other hand, GMO crops deplete the soil twice as quickly. They also can’t be planted next to any non-GMO plant, not even diagonally. Better plan accordingly...

-Beware blackberries! They’re a bigger problem for the GMO farmer (since he can’t plant crops next to them), but if you let them grow out of control both sides will regret it.
-Harvesting a crop depletes that tile’s Fertility. Rain improves the Fertility of any empty tile by 1. Blackberries only grow after rainfall. . .at first.

-If an Organic crop is immediately downwind of a GMO crop, cross-pollination occurs; the Organic crop is replaced with a fresh GMO crop, under the Organic player’s control.
-Cross-pollination never happens diagonally. GMO crops behave the same no matter who owns them, so an Organic farmer might want to clear his GMO crop before it infects its neighbors.

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