Hi Sven!

Am I correct in thinking you were in my seminar group last year? Or am I getting old ?

Hope the HKU is treating its students well these days! I miss those corridors.

-J

Interesting turn about 'designing everything'. My current game is practically all by me, and I have reached a comfort zone where I realize that to make larger games I need to get more people to work on it - whilst fearing letting others in who may not understand what I am driving at.

The whole issue of authorship in games is poignant, large productions all seem quite soulless. The small quirky indie-games with their small quirky flaws are far more 'warm'. I think large games should definitely move towards authorship and try and say something. Perhaps modern culture is against this to begin with? I hear so many gamers who say they do not want clever stuff. They'd rather have a re-hash of robots from the 70's.

Interesting irony in interactive media is that if you let it be goalless the player will always assume he may have missed something - and if you give him a signal when the goal has been fulfilled he cannot function without having that final goal. I suppose the better path for a scene-based game would be to make clear the means and nature of interaction (the explorable elements) and let the gameplay be in the manipulation of these elements rather than the exploration. Otherwise there will always be the fear of not having pixel-hunted properly - I hated that most in old adventuregames, I like puzzles but they would always rely on a factor I simply did not notice - and the environments were nice, but I would rather spend time in them because they are nice (as I am prone to do in Riven) rather than because I have to find a button about 10 pixels large (which happened, also, in Riven).

Because the character would never literary say such a thing to himself - the comment 'I do not like steak' is a thought that you would not find in a well-written book, even. You may have a narrator telling you you do not like steak, but that establishes a relationship with the narrator.

Actually you will see a lot of this sort of character-acting-as-narrator-while-thinking-out-loud in animation. I noticed it particularly in the Miyazaki adaptation of Howl's Moving Castle where it seemed kind of weird, but I think it's a pretty common technique. No reason that it couldn't work with interactive characters...

When I see the character in Howl's Moving Castle I never assume the character 'is me'; I have sympathy with the character rather than seeing the character as my embodiment. I think my point is more that this type of writing emphasises a relation between player and character that is more 'solo' on the side of the character.

So if the player controls locomotion and is at the brink of entering a dark room and the character pipes up: "I am afraid of the dark;" the character is more asking for sympathy as-if external to the player. If the vision becomes blurred and the breathing heavier the player is afraid as-if he himself (his embodiment) is afraid, affecting his agency in the world.

I realize what you said about the character in Howl's Moving Castle and I should not have been so negative about it, although I rarely like it as a cinematic form. It may cover up for the lack of delicate motions of real actors (like in the excellent Deadwood) but it can also be cheap exposition relying on me being told what goes on whilst watching a medium (film) that to me is more about interpretation. In the same sense that a game is to me more about embodiment than about interpretation, let alone being told what is going on.

This is a wonderful topic and it is a shame I am so busy - so I will just enjoy reading it. I have a prototype model-paper that is nearly finished very close to this subject and the concept of the character declaring he likes steak or not.

In short, on the steak, my reasoning is that a character telling you (even if speaking in self-referential 1st person) establishes a relationship with you that is not the same as acting as the character. Because the character would never literary say such a thing to himself - the comment 'I do not like steak' is a thought that you would not find in a well-written book, even. You may have a narrator telling you you do not like steak, but that establishes a relationship with the narrator. A more objective response that you would also have if you are confronted with this yourself is what I reason would establish 'symbiosis' with the character; in real life, I do not consciously go 'ugh' when seeing a McDonalds hamburger, but I hear myself saying it. A comment like that plays out as-if you are yourself. Generally, I think you need to mimic effects, rather than establish a dialogue of any kind.

On puppetry, I reason the player has an extension of himself in the world; virtual agency. This can be anything or even part of a character. If you intrude on this the player can feel his agency is taken away. So telling a player 'you do not like steak' in an RPG where the player has just himself decided that he is a person who likes steak is an intrusion. It is more about establishing a set of rules which areas he and the character are 'dominant' on and which not.

Art is dead, long live art? A new group may pick up the flag. Though the man who wields the dagger never becomes king

I personally cannot be satisfied with having Bach. I for one am happy to have The Path as well; not that you are on the same level as Bach. But The Path is important to me on a different level. And I imagine in some decades someone will make what I can only describe as 'life-inspiring' in the field of games.

I personally resent the existence of Hirst. A friend of mine kept saying that I should not speak out on modern art so spitefully unless I looked at it properly - but whereas a single Turner can speak to me the entire Tate Modern was one large hive of idiocracy. I noted carefully that I looked at the pretty room guards more than at the red painting splashed against walls and the oversized tables. And the Turner exhibition at the Tate Britain was wonderful and portrayed life and dynamics. Hirst is not intellectualism. It is contrived, in my opinion. A dandy such as Wilde is intellectual. Knowing much, being witty and smart is intellectual. You have all the knowledge and know how to combine it. Hirst makes statements and surprises people with something new. On me that has the same effect as people showing YouTube clips from comedy shows. After 100 minutes there is just nothing funny left because the jokes contain nothing.

I still very much appreciate a man such as Ruskin and his statements about art. I think artistic films and games resemble his ideas on art a lot more than modern art. Not that Ruskin (who for his wise words was a stock-up slightly paedophilic prude) is the all-knowing. But the concept of art as a medium of communicating observation rendered more concrete through the mind of a closely studying artist is what I see art as. I am tired of tv-shows playing on my emotions and of red paint on walls making me angry. Turner's painting did not have a sad violin playing next to them. I will decide what to see in Turner. Modern art supposedly is all about interpretation but... having a sweet girl give you a courteous smile is fun to interpret because it can mean any number of pleasantries. Having her say "you are always like that" without divulging is modern art.

EDIT: Some said The Path was too modern and purposefully too vague. But although it was vague it left me satisfied with enough to think about. Wondering what it meant was more like being with a friend in a museum and noticing a satir in the shrubs and smiling to one-another going; "I wonder what that signifies?.."

(I have not spoken with someone who resents modern art for so long, I think I just ranted a little of my annoyance of it)

Your concept only really works when it is seen as a criticism of games. If you read it as a metaphor for life, it's very sad (and almost an encouragement to be conservative).  

You can see it as an argument against escapism. Going down some mine to find treasure is nonsense, yet so many people are convinced that their person 'coal mine' will suddenly produce diamonds; like a person going out in his student years either backs up from the drunken student slummer or falls and breaks his legs... the complete fulfilment, the 10/10, is just a promise through the glorification of such things in the media, I think. Looking at beauty ideals, love ideals, career ideals, family ideals, eating ideals... nobody can do all that without letting go of the safety wire. I could open a random issue of Cosmo Magazine and have enough material to make this a metaphor for the bad things in life

EDIT: With Michael Samyn's Memorial in the background? That song haunts me. It is the new More News From Nowhere.

Jeroen D. Stout:
I like your idea! Would be be fun to see it made, even though I know the twist now

I really like small games with where the design is more "holistic" and where you need to play it to the end to grasp it. It especially works nicely for smaller games and "Everyday the same day" and "Beacon" are really good interesting example of this.

Perhaps something for the after-hours it would be good to get a nice little cheeky 'swing' on the abseiling, get back some 2.5D gameplay... but I am not meeting enough deadlines as-is
EDIT: See, I am already making it 'fun'; swing on abseiling. I need to make the gameplay... thoughtful? Like We The Giants and as you mention, Every Day the Same Day.

If you make this into an actual game (which I would advice) it would be a nihilistic version of You Have To Burn The Rope...

Actually that would be a great mini game, that sort of focus on the pointlessness of games. That sort of mocks the player, telling them how they are wasting their lives (preferably not directly but making the player realize it their selves).

I am really tempted...

I had a concept once of a treasure-seeker abseiling into a cave (I only just remembered) where he would collect treasures; 1/10; &c; and he would eventually get to 9/10 but run out of rope. So the player gets a button to disconnect his wire, obviously a move which would kill him. If he does he falls down onto the last treasure and breaks his legs and can never leave the cave again; but has a 10/10 rating. I wanted to give the main character a back-story of escaping his real-life problems by his dreams of sorting things out easily by obtaining money as treasure in caves.

I never made this game because I thought it would be too much work put into a game which is only a mocking of other genres. And making it I would just be tempted to make the game fun by itself, sort-of removing the stinging point.

I like the weak point whilst sobbing, however, a very strong one.

I feel more comfortable making good low art than making bad high art.

Many paintings are more historically significant rather than special in their own right... surely an author like Hemmingway is high art as well?

The fear of making high art sounds, if I may make a personal observation, just like a fear of doing things 'for real'. No. If you go out there you should make the best you can. No 'but I am only a small artist'; you can play with 'the big boys', the only rule is that you must take critique like one?.. I mean a big boy like big artists, not big companies.

I am melodramatic, of course. But I would urge you to stand tall. You said before you want to inspire others. Then be a father to the art industry, not a man behind the curtains. The smaller developers need to stop this weird 'in the shades' thing. One day our work must stand up to Rembrandt, Mozart and Hemmingway. If the industry is too busy making flash-bang-bang and we are too busy saying we are not big enough then I personally  have no clue who will make highbrow games. We will need the confidence to require people to judge our work as high art. Proper artists need to reclaim the title art and be brave enough to use it as their flag.

If you make this into an actual game (which I would advice) it would be a nihilistic version of You Have To Burn The Rope...

I really like this thought of scenes. It is certainly something I might look into for my final project. I remember a concept I had for a walkabout game in which you would walk through the house of the media magistrate in The Fountainhead, beautifully designed, and then you would hear radio flashbacks and see newspaper clippings about the past, leading up to the 'inevitable' end of the character in the book. A bit like Salome but more wordy - did you call that a vignette, Michael? I remember you used a nice word for it.

I think an important issue is that the purpose of a place or scene is dictated by expectations. So if the player thinks he starts a game he will look for puzzles. But you can tell him there will be no puzzles, naturally. Downside is that all other media have some limit; film, books, poetry; all have a narrative. Even many walks through the woods follow a route that has a beginning and end. So just dropping the player in a room (or field of flowers if I get my way) will not really communicate a goalless system. But again, you can just tell the player. "Enter the field, leave whenever you will. You can walk around but only Lucy knows the names of the flowers." Sort-of how I start my game currently; "You play the locomotion of Lucy..."

If we are going for realistic narrative I doubt there is any reason for keeping a player in a room - one more lost key and I will personally scream. But in a game such as The Path or Salome the narrative takes a step back, like in a poem. So we could. But;
It indeed is more about the fantasy of the player. Why not let him go if he wants to? In the Netherlands there is an amusement part sort-of like Disneyland but themed around little humanoid creatures (silly Hobbits) called 'Laven' who have their village. There are no attractions I can think of in that part of the park, but as a child I used to love it. In fact, I remember that part of my youth with a huge charm because that little village was somehow 'real' and the attractions were more just excitement. In that area you could stumble upon a bakery where the Laven were making (delicious?) Laaf bread and it would feel like you discovered it yourself; then you would run to your parents (no more than few feet behind) and tell them what you saw and invent a wholelot more. There is also a fairytale forest with just fairytale characters - again with no attractions one can enter. If people enter the park and walk through this area because nothing prevents them from stopping then that would be their loss.

If Disneyland is an excellent example for leveldesigners (as it to my annoyance so often is used) then perhaps The Country of the Laves is our example? A wonderful place of exploration?
Lets all just go there!

I had an idea that started a while back; I am a great enthusiast of the nude side Domai, which is nude but without being sexual. It propagates shameless enjoyable beauty in nature, a bit like naturalism; from the viewpoint that nudity != sexual. Over the past months I had some discussions with Brits about this subject, starting with 'haha, silly prudish Brits' going to '', so I thought of how to use games to challenge this notion. Along came a game set in the sort-of scenic water/sun-lit rock environment Domai often has, in which you walk a (clothed) woman to a bathing spot, where to the player's (feigned) surprise she undresses. So far things to many would be 'sexy'. Then the game would just be about... sunbathing, rock-climbing, swimming. To the point where the player has played in a single area as a nude woman for so long; having no goals; no options that are vaguely sexual; so he would sort-of get simply the enjoyable feeling of the experience of beauty. It bothered me for ages how I could make anything without goals. If I plant a flag at the top of a rock and tell the player to go get it then I have just made a normal game but with the perverted angle of having a nude avatar. If I make the game simply with a nude woman without goals then the experience itself becomes the main part.
When I just read this thread I realize this game is just a scene in which you can spend as much time as you want, looking for all the interactions. Perhaps she can pick flowers and put them in her hair? Carry around lilies? Dry in the sunlight?.. Doing a deferred interaction like in The Path would be very good. Specifically, I just realize this game is a mature Land of Laaf in which you get a scene that is rare to obtain in real life (especially since you control a character that is not you) which you can just explore.

Having a simple scene would make what the player does the focus. Just having an enjoyable environment and an enjoyable character to do it with. I do not need a timer or goals. If you create a pleasant environment I will look around it. I certainly want a mature Country of the Laves.

I very much liked this post. I think the comparison is quite excellent - this morning I put Björk on and wondered what exactly made me see Björk as 'elevated' compared to some of the pop music when it uses the same technology. But yes, I am listening to Nick Cave, who adds more to the medium - makes it harder to listen to, as well. A friend endlessly complains she thinks 'he has a horrible voice' and Metamorphosis by Philip Glass is 'just the same two tones all over again'. I like (require) my music to pose some challenge, she goes more by initial value. I think that holds for a lot of art - and we can put games in that model with it.

But games have two 'skills'; the capability and the intellectual. I think I sound like you when I pose the 'problem'; you want to listen to Nick Cave and then the CD asks you to dance well enough otherwise track 2 is inaccessible to you. You are willing to make the intellectual commitment to Siouxsie but not the menial physical capacity?

Thank you, also, for expanding my to play list!

[http://wethegiants.thegiftedintrovert.com/]

http://wethegiants.thegiftedintrovert.com/

Here is a clever game I stumbled upon via Gamers With Jobs. It operates within the logic of standard games but has an angle of a notgame.

I will not reveal much more, it is a very short game

I like difficult beautiful rare words, they make conversations like walking through a field of pretty flowers ()

Ludus: Strict play by rules
Paidia: Free play; unstructured and spontanious

In what interesting ways might these categories differ from the more traditional Apollonian/Dionysian due?

Paidia would not be necessarily letting go of your senses and giving in to inner desire, if I understand this Dionysian reference well. Perhaps it is culture but the juxtaposition of serious strokey-beard Apollo and the drunken loose Dionysus always jars me. If I hit my glass with my spoon accidentally and following all the guests at a dinner party tune in for a random symphony - that is paidia. If we all agree upfront that the last person to hit his glass must down it (pub games ) then that is ludus.
If we all throw our glasses on the floor, jump on the table, dance in a wild fashion... the structure of it would be a game with paidia. Mimicry; probably; we have our 'we are drunk' masks on and make fools of ourselves. But that is not a necessary element of paidia itself.

But I am sort of whilst not against fun; against Dionyusian fun; I think the whole point of being human is to find intellectual ways to fulfil our desires.

We did get in trouble with this though with Fatale. We had overestimated people's knowledge of the theme of the femme fatale in general and the legend of Salome in particular, let alone Oscar Wilde's version of it. So much so that several people read the play first before playing Fatale. Which is not altogether a bad thing, but not what we had expected.

Fairy tales are better as a common ground to start off of. People don't know their bible (or historic literature) anymore!

I watched the film version (which featured Oscar Wilde in a play-within-a-film fashion), which was rather excellent. I knew a lot about Wilde but the play was unknown to me, rather a novelty. I think the problem with Salome was I did not know what to expect and it was hard to find out purely from the interaction. The problem for me was more the lack of clear interaction than lack of understanding of the story.

It is a problem I am working on myself, however. I added a section to the start of my game in which you see the character's hand and press a key to "take control" over it. Text will appear that says that in this game you do not play a person, nor yourself, but part of someone's subconscious. I know that in 25 years this message will be laugh-worthy but I think for now allowing people more view on what their actions will be like is a great addition because people will now be able to know what will be their reward and their actions: rather than assuming from previous knowledge (and given that there is no previous version of this, their knowledge would be wrong).

Hooking into something Thomas and I were speaking about in my research thread (which I am still working on ), this message is communication between me as a designer and the player... I also adapted my interface to be of a different style to the game content to keep a sort of 'distance' between the player and the character; I made some design errors in making the character capable of 'symbiosis' with the player so I prefer people listening to the character like a story and interacting with him more out of mimicry play than a feeling they are ultimately involved.

Is the terms "ludic" restricted to the rigid requirements that most game designers have for games? The dictionary says "playful in an aimless way" and give "the ludic behavior of kittens" as an example. In that sense I'm totally not opposed to ludus myself. For me playfulness is a very important part of the appreciation of art. Kittens may be the ultimate art audience!  

I always am a great fan of Roger Callois, from Man, Play and Games (Les jeux et les hommes).

He had four categories of games:
Agôn: Skill & Competition
Alea: Chance
Ilinx: Thrills
Mimicry: Pretence

And two extremes to define them:
Ludus: Strict play by rules
Paidia: Free play; unstructured and spontanious

Many games have elements from all. In his book he also describes the 'perversion' of categories such as alea with horoscopes (which are taken serious but are just a game of chance). I always think his book is brilliant because it derives sociology from play rather than play as as subset in sociology.

Most shooting games are agôn and ilinx with their competitive shooting and mindless explosions, many 'bored housewife' games such as peggle have large influences of alea.
Notgames would be low on agôn and high on mimicry, not being about skills and rather about pretence (seeing the situation as 'real').

These categories were a comfort when I found them studying gamedesign and being confronted with the singleton (somewhat childish) attitudes of most developers and their lack of language on this subject.