game

“Will It Be Good” Is The Wrong Question To Ask About “No Man’s Sky”

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Becron5
I’m looking forward to No Man’s Sky, a video game of space exploration.  If you haven’t heard of it, it’s a game a few years in development that promises exploration of a giantic, procedurally-generated galaxy. It sounds like it’s going to hit a lot of my sweet spots with exploration, mystery, procedural generation, and visuals off of a prog rock album cover.  If you’re not up to speed on it, this reddit archive is helpful.

As the game promises a lot, comes from a small team, and has had it’s share of delays, there’s obvious skepticism out there in the world of gaming – at least to judge by the threads, discussions, and so forth that I see.. The question comes again and again – will No Man’s Sky be any good?

That’s actually the wrong question.

Clearly, the game has a lot put into it. Interviews with the developers and demonstrations show a serious dedication to the project. There are videos discussing the procedural generation that seem to show that, yes, this giant universe can be made. The idea of wedding modern graphics and procedural generation together to make huge, infinite worlds doesn’t sounds particularly outrageous.  Getting it to work sounds at least probable, and we’ve seen demos constantly that suggest it’s going to work.

From what I’ve seen of the game, I expect No Man’s Sky’s going to deliver pretty much what’s promised – a change to run around an enormous setting, find stuff, build equipment, and explore cool things.

The real question is not “will it be good” – it’s “is it going to be what people want?”  Any team this public, any team making these promises, would be foolish to screw this up.  The question people should ask is really is this a game you’re going to enjoy.

From what I can tell No Man’s Sky involves:

  1. Traveling in space.
  2. In space you may encounter places to trade and enemies to fight, if you want.
  3. If you choose to fight, you affect how factions regard you, and may be able to call for help in fights..
  4. You travel to procedurally generated solar systems.
  5. You land on planets which are procedurally generated.
  6. On the planets you find resources, catalog things, upload data, and maybe find odd and interesting stuff.
  7. There are probably some other secrets and things you can do to have impacts.
  8. Build new equipment with resources, and go back to #1.
  9. This takes place in a sort-of-shared setting that happens to be enormous.

To me this sounds great. It sounds like a game I’ll put a lot of hours into, and then play more casually, now and then finding a new planet to wonder at before moving on.  This is something I easily see me playing for 3-9 months in total because it pushes all my buttons.  This and Starbound will probably occupy my gaming space for 2016 and parts of 2017.

But it’s also cleary not a game for everyone. You don’t build homes or colonies worlds, you don’t lead fleets or create super-customized ships. There’s the simplest factional system. It’s a game about a journey, and it has both classic space game elements while lacking others.

I think there’s reason to have confidence in the developers, but when the game hits I expect we’ll see people both enthralled and disappointed with No Man’s Sky.  The game is going to not be for everyone, and that seems to be due to a deliberate choice about development. However with all the hype, I think there are people who are interested in the game due to hype, not if they’d actually enjoy it or only because they’ve projected expectations onto it.

Once it launches in June 2016, I want to watch the public and reviewer reactions.  Me, I’ll be exploring space.

  • Steve

Make It So: Experiential Games And Worldbuilding

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bridge forest trees

Lately I’ve been trying to shake up my gaming interests, try out new video games beyond my usual (which is a mix of Rougelike, RPG, and occasional tactical and action). Gaming can often get “samey,” with similar ideas and mechanics cycled over and over again. Most AAA titles bore me, and there’s only so much faceless minion shooting I can give a damn about.

(OK I do love TF2 but in that case it’s just plain fun and you’re shooting other people’s characters. Or in my case setting them on fire or blowing them up with automated turrets.)

I’ve been on a huge Indie kick lately, which has been rewarding, spending time with Sanctuary RPG: Black, Darkest Dungeon, and of course my continuing love affair with Dungeonmans. Most of those are, of course, in my usual genre/mechanic wheelhouse. All of these have fighting monsters as a core part of their mechanical. I figured it was time to explore more.

I discovered two experiential games that intrigued me – games where the goal is to have an experience over manipulation of the environment.

  • Drizzlepath. This is a simple game of hiking up a mountain, and as you do so you see cool things, encounter new mood music, and experience a disturbingly poetic beat narration that hints at a plot. It’s like someone made a musical/poetic montage of a mountain climb, and for five bucks it was interesting and artistic. Kind of like paying five bucks to go to an indie art film, so really a bargain.
  • Proteus. Imagine a game of walking through a child’s drawing while a Prog Rock jam occurred. This game sticks you on a procedurally generated island and what you encounter as you wander creates the soundtrack. A relaxing experience, best experienced with headphones, I use it now and then to chill out.

There are plenty of others out there – “Dear Esther” is one oft recommended – but these two little games made me think about games whose goal is not to be “played” (that is at least partially controlled) but explored and experienced. As you may guess I’m the guy who’d wander around randomly in Skyrim for an hour, so these games push my buttons.

Experiential games like the above got me thinking about world building. Of course, many things do, but in this case I had a very interesting idea of what to do with fictional worlds we build . . .

All That Lovely Information

When we build worlds for our games and stories, we build a lot of settings and characters and history. We often build more than people see – after all the working watch doesn’t need to show you it’s gears. There’s just so much in our creations that’s amazing and interesting, yet rarely seen by our audiences.

Most people who like games and fictions and their worlds enjoy, in part, the wandering and the lore, especially in world-centric RPGs. If you’ve ever seen people get into a debate about a fictional setting, or discuss its minute, you know what I mean. If you’ve ever sat at your game console or computer or stared at an amazing vista, you understand.

One of the fun of good world building is experiencing it. Not playing it. Not looking at stats. Being there.

You probably see where I’m going with this.

The Experiential Game As Spinoff and Partner

So I’ll get to the core of my idea, having led you here so blatantly – world builders should consider releasing experiential games (or game mods) of their worlds so people can just get to know them.

Imagine being able to wander around your favorite fictional city or kingdom (as is oft done in Minecraft, where people will build anything). Imagine an interactive map and history of a world that you can play around in. Imagine just being able to walk around and talk and watch and read your favorite world for awhile. No monster mashing or drama or economics, just being there.

I’m not proposing a “full” AAA game of just poking around, more a kind of tie-in or freebie to go with a larger work. Something cheaper or free to act as a compliment to a greater project to give people a new way to experience the setting they love.

Worldbuilders usually have a bunch of notes and stats and maps. Why not put them to use.

Think of all the ways this could be done . . .

Different Forms For the World Experience Game

As I’ve analyzed this, I can see several ways to pull off the “experiential game” for world builders. here’s just a handful of ideas to get you started.

  • The simple wander. Just build familiar settings in existing tools or even games so people can poke around and enjoy. If you’ve got enough fans they probably are already doing this.
  • The interactive wander. A bit more than the above, have part of your setting but with minority interactive elements that provide lore, dialogue, etc.
  • The library or map. Create a game that’s a bit of a library or map that shows different times in history, character profiles, and more. Done with a good art style you could make it a fun, immersive experience – perhaps even creating new narrative characters like a librarian to talk to.
  • The chat. Building on the above idea, what if you did a visual novel like game of just chatting to characters. You could even build a mini plot around it where you play the historian or historian’s apprentice, gathering information.
  • The buddy system. Take the idea of the chat-game above, and release mini games focused on individual characters. In each game you get to pal around or talk to one of the characters. People can pick and choose which ones to download or buy. It might even provide some interesting feedback when you see who most wants to talk to whom!

I’m sure you can come up with many other ways to do this. Considering all the tools out there, I’m sure with the right time and effort, non-programers could do some of the simpler mechanics proposed. That’s not even going and bugging your friends for help.

Meanwhile, if you’re paid enough as an author/creator/worldbuilder, I bet you could pitch one of the above ideas to the right people.

Let’s Take The World Farther

I’m enamored of this idea of “experiential world game.” It builds on the desire for knowledge, for wanderlust, and makes a great way to experience a media anew. It uses gaming as a way to enrich media and our ways to make it and tell it. It’s also a damn fun idea from what I can tell.

Maybe if people try this a trend can happen. I’d not be adverse to a world where a TV series spins off a free interactive game or cheap interactive game. I’d love to see past famous works put into experiential games as a way to see them anew.

And I’m sure you have ideas to go even farther – let’s hear them . . .

Respectfully,

– Steven Savage
http://www.musehack.com/
http://www.informotron.com/
http://www.seventhsanctum.com/

Learn The Job Search Game

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Running Of The Bulls

So after spending a lot of time discussing the Dark Side Of Do What You Love, I’m going to focus on one more depressing subject right now: the recruiting mess.

Now let me preface this by noting that I’m going to defend recruiters. In my experience most recruiters are great people in a very challenging situation. As I often note if you think your job is awful, imagine having to interview twenty or thirty people like you in a week and you get the idea. For extra spice, imagine what kind of other bad decisions they have to put up with.

So I’m not going to diss them.

But let us be honest, the process of finding a job sucks. It’s not fun. It’s challenging, and unless you get into it (as some of us do), it’s painful. It’s why I keep writing and speaking on it.

And here’s something you need to do.

You need to learn the game.

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