tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post1824182552195753118..comments2024-03-18T19:44:51.140+00:00Comments on Inventory Full: One More Time, With FeelingBhagpusshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-71602168793970748202013-01-28T11:22:54.030+00:002013-01-28T11:22:54.030+00:00All leisure activities sit somewhere on a curve fr...All leisure activities sit somewhere on a curve from observation to participation. Computer games in general are already very far along the curve towards participation, requiring much more active involvement than many other leisure options. Even the most trivial video game requires a much greater level of active, physical involvement than watching TV or listening to music, although not necessarily a greater intellectual or emotional involvement.<br /><br />Even pure themepark MMOs must be near the top of the scale for active involvement. Whether there's really anything you could call a true mass market for the next step up from that, the full-on sandbox, remains to be seen. My feeling is that full-on sandbox gameplay, Wurm Online style, attracts very much the same personality type that builds model railway layouts. Then again, The Sims...Bhagpusshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03499162165023939880noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1510920011443550663.post-77079742837946237832013-01-27T23:45:34.503+00:002013-01-27T23:45:34.503+00:00Well, you've hit upon the sandbox then. A sand...Well, you've hit upon the sandbox then. A sandbox game with intrinsic, not extrinsic rewards allows you to play because you want to (and not just to get the next shiny armor).<br /><br />And you've hit upon a couple of solutions to the impossible story factory:<br />1) Go sandbox, imply the story from what is happening. This is like EVE Online, where you control your "Story" that is happening, but the stories that emerge look more like news stories than deep narrative.<br />2) User-generated stories. Unreliable (as you mention), a few gems hidden among a heap of banal stories (even if the mechanics in place to create your own stories are brilliant)<br />3) Computer-generated stories. So far, boring and exceedingly repetitive.<br /><br />I actually have a lot of hope for Procedrually generated stories, or what I call the Artifical Intelligence Dungeon Master. Still working out the kinks, but I'm betting you it's possible to push the bar for computer-made story quality far beyond the low standard they have now (especially under the watchful eye of a team of creative human narrators).<br /><br />But hey, the wave of the future is user-generated sandbox, as Smedley says. Perhaps the wave after that wave will be AI-generated sandbox.<br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com