The other day I was present during a workshop in one of Brenda’s courses, in which students have to design a game using six object selected from the aptly-named “Box of Crap:” a largely random collection of dice, toys, and miscellaneous junk on the order of the sort you’d find in a vending machine or [...]
I’ve just finished reading an excellent history on one of my favorite subjects: tall ship history and combat. This particular work chronicles the ships, sailors, engagements, and politics of the War of 1812 — the last great naval war in the age of fighting sail (Bonaparte fell for good in 1815, steamships were on the [...]
[Republished from my thesis blog. See the previous example for more info.]
One possibility I have considered for the enactment of my game is placing players in the position of the evildoer.
I mentioned in a previous post the McDonald’s Flash game, in which players play as corporate magnates shepherding a simplified McDonalds corporation. The objective [...]
A number of recent events — my 13th game design and it’s response, a post by Yehuda, and some first-hand play experience — have led me to reflect on the idea of cooperative games: specifically, games that feature all players acting together against the game itself.
All games are competitive in some way, even the conceptual [...]
[Disclaimer]: In addition to my regular schoolwork, I am also working on my MFA thesis at the moment, and keeping a blog to catalogue its progress. In the interest of privacy and security I can’t go into too much detail, but I can say that I’m working on a problem that involves producing a serious [...]
From a recent post by Yehuda (itself a redux of a much older post on the same theme):
Another classification tool . . . is the “game mechanic“. By game mechanic, I don’t mean game components, such as dice, cards, or “running”. These are good and solid components within games and very useful for classification.
What I [...]
Consider: two players compete in a high-stakes match for a coveted slot in a tournament championship round. Both players are nervous—they know their opponent is strong and will be difficult to defeat even under normal circumstances, let alone with the pressure and stress of tournament match. Neither can afford a loss. One player, cracking under [...]
I recently discovered this hilarious phenomenon. Basically, a flash mob is like a very brief, highly specific, and totally impersonal LARP: a large group of people (the more the better, I surmise) perform some predetermined act in the same public space simultaneously just for the hell of it and then disperse quickly. The videos to [...]
The other day I finally completed my hard-fought, bloody conquest of the planet Kronus. While victory was always certain—merely a matter of time, and a question of in which order my enemies would perish—it was nonetheless a lengthy campaign and a fight worthy of the Emperor’s Finest. But by the time I had purged the [...]
Much can be said about the indie scene in today’s industry: it’s hip, it’s sexy, it’s big business and getting bigger, it’s the guardian of innovation, it’s the future… I believe these are all true. The indie scene is certainly my pick for the right path both for individual developers and the industry as a [...]