intfiction.org

I'm glad someone asked; I couldn't bring myself to

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Games, Fonts, and Font-Toys For Gamers - http://www.cumberlandgames.com

Since she's coming from plenty of experience with visual novels, I'd assume she has the least trouble with those. I could see myself ranking them similarly -- I find generating simple static images (especially if a lot of layer re-use is within genre conventions) about as difficult as writing equally evocative prose. Not that I've ever written a visual novel. Perhaps it is time to try!

Then why not give the semblace of choices, just allowthe player to make a choice that changes the story for a short while then it meets back with the main plot. And since it was already mentioned I want to ask why don't you add more sub-quests things tha don't affect the main course of the game but are fun to do anyway?

I am busy with a gameand I find adding a bunch of small sub-quests easy to do, and I think it would make games more fun.

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Ever notice how the "happy face " looks more like a "trying to pass gas face"

Ghalve:
You are correct. I am a very visual person and would much rather draw you a picture of a room than actually describe it.

(Easy)
Visual Novel
CYOA
IF
RPG (2D)
(Not so Easy)

I started doing NaNoWriMo to get myself to write more. If left to my own devices, I would write in point form. (That's why I like coding)My boss an I got into a discussion about putting friendly blurbs in when I was sending reports. i.e. "Please find attached a copy of the Weekly Report." My point was that I send the report every week with the same subject line. They should know it's the report. Why do I need to add extra words? (See my signature. )

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Decisions in Games

I recently stumbled on to this article through a link on Emily Short's blog:

The Decision Gap http://blog.failbettergames.com/post/Th ... n-Gap.aspx

I liked the list the author gave for different types of decisions:
- Causal - Do X the king dies, Do y the king survives
- Bling - Attack the dog - nothing; run away from the dog - stumble onto +5 stealth collar
- Reflective - read the article, it explains it better

I think more use could be made of reflective decisions.

example: if you help the girl rescue her kitten, you get "the Kind" added to your name. No in game benefit, but players think it's cool.

Susan

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Most of you are familiar with the virtues of a programmer. There are three, of course: laziness, impatience, and hubris.
- Larry Wall

That's essentially what we advocate doing at Choice of Games. We call it "Delayed Branching" and have written a few articles about it.

http://www.choiceofgames.com/2011/07/by ... esnt-suck/
http://www.choiceofgames.com/2011/07/7- ... eat-stats/
http://www.choiceofgames.com/2010/03/5- ... ice-games/

I'd also like to emphasize that adding multiple endings to a game is relatively easy; branching the plot at the end of the game is certainly the easiest time to do it, because you can have a linear plot all the way up to the ending, at which point you can choose an ending.

Branching the plot earlier than that is much more work if the forks don't merge back together. That's why we advocate delayed branching all the way up to the end of the game, at which point you can introduce multiple endings based on the player's final choices and the stats/world model.

Susan: very interesting link, and it just made me realise that I did play a game that was almost entirely "reflective": "The X-Files", the one that came out for PC and PS (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_X-Files_Game).

There's lots of things you can do in the game, lots of ways to approach the story, that mean diddly-squat in terms of mechanic but to build - in the player's head - a different picture every time you play and do things differently. It's not just a couple of scenes, or a couple of decisions, it's almost like there was a rough skeleton of a game (on which the gameplay mechanic is built) and everything else is just optional stuff that is only of benefit for the story the player is getting inside his/her head.

A couple examples:



Just brought it up because it seemed relevant - it's almost an entire game built of reflective choices.

Part of the problem with side-treks, and other substantial optional content, is that most IF is not designed for heavy replay. Partly this is a self-fulfilling prophecy -- players don't replay because they don't expect much variation, authors don't put in much variation because players don't replay. But part of it's to do with the fact that IF is as much like a novel as it is like a game: you don't generally finish a novel and then read it again five times. (It's worth bearing in mind that the area of IF that has the biggest tendency for side-treks and optional content is AIF. AIF has, uh, a central function that's distinct from those of mainline IF, and which makes heavy replay a lot more likely.)

/me raises hand...

I do.

Getting back on topic...
Replayability:
I also think you expend more energy playing an IF versus playing a Visual Novel. You are much more into the nitty-gritty of advancing the plot. More like a novel hooked up to a bicycle. If you don't peddle, the plot doesn't advance. I get "tired" thinking of having to go through all that effort again.

On the other hand, a CYOA or Visual Novel, there is less effort. You need only click the button to continue. (Or you can even set it to auto advance!) You are only called to do something at specific points in the story.

Sims have more replayability since you can use different tactics on different play throughs.

RPGs are more of a mixed bag. I am plot driven, to I usually only play through one to get the main plot. My husband tries to get everything, so he will replay an RPG to see what it is like for a warrior vs a mage. This makes final boss battles funny. I am usually underpowered and only manage to beat the boss by the skin of my teeth. My husband is uber super powered with every magic trinket in the game and the boss battle is over in seconds.

No point really, just thinking out loud.

Susan

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Most of you are familiar with the virtues of a programmer. There are three, of course: laziness, impatience, and hubris.
- Larry Wall

What a curious belief, sir

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Games, Fonts, and Font-Toys For Gamers - http://www.cumberlandgames.com

Yeah, that was poorly-considered of me, and vaguely articulated to boot.

I meant, I suppose, that people don't generally read it again five times right away. Which may not be true of everybody, either. But you're right; books are multi-purpose things, and different people have indefinitely many different functions for 'em. I don't re-read books right away, and I think the reasons for this are similar to some of the reasons why IF tends to be low-replay, but a full unpacking of this would be horribly rambly and meandering.