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Posted in Blog, Games, MMORPG, Virtual Worlds on Jul 15th, 2009
Two articles that popped up on MMORPG.com in recent days both touched on the same subject – roleplay servers in MMOs. The first one, by Dana Massey, denounce roleplay servers as unenforceable, virtually identical to regular servers and generally a major pain in the ass for those who have to moderate them. Sanya Weathers wrote [...]
Posted in Blog, Design, Games, MMORPG, Virtual Worlds on Jun 17th, 2009
This is the second installment in a series of posts I’ll be making about The Laws of Online World Design, as explained in this introductory post. I will start at the top of the list, and work my way down until I’ve poked and prodded every law in the list, not skipping any unless I really feel like it. In this, Part II of the series, I’ll concentrate on the following law:
Modes of expression
Posted in Games on Jun 2nd, 2009
Holy crap, BatmanGuybrush! This is awesome news: One of the best kept secrets in game development history has been revealed. Telltale Games and LucasArts have put out a joint press-release announcing two brand spanking new Monkey Island-projects. The first one is an episode-based, five-part series by Telltale – Tales of Monkey Island – and the [...]
I haven’t really been giving this blog the attention I should lately, and I beg pardon for that – though I blame life, the universe and everything. I do have some more posts brewing, but not sure when I’ll have time/will to finish them up and hit the publish button. Anyways, enough excuses, have a [...]
Saw the following meme/game thingy at MMO Gamers and thought I’d jump on the band wagon since I have nothing else to write about at the moment. The goal, according to Bio Break (where this little game originated), is to finish the following statement with a simple response, substituting different games into the sentence: “I [...]
Posted in Design, Games, MMORPG, Virtual Worlds on Mar 14th, 2009
On the 1st of March, Danc (Daniel Cook) posted a very interesting entry in his Lost Garden-blog about game design styles. He lists a number of different styles he has observed in game designers, then describes his own definitions of what each style consists of and what shortcomings/limitations it may have.
The styles he listed:
Copycat: make a game like another game that is interesting.
Experience: Make a distinct moment of game play that looks and feels interesting.
Narrative: Make a story that is interesting
World: Make a place or world that is interesting
Systems: Make systems and objects that are interesting.
Player Skills: Make verbs for the player that are interesting.
He ends his article with a couple of questions, one of which I’ll tackle here:
What style of game designer are you? Do you fit into one of these approaches?
Posted in Blog, Virtual Worlds on Mar 3rd, 2009
Woah. I just finished watching World Builder, a short film about a man building a realistic-looking virtual world using holographic tools from inside a “holodeck” of sorts.
This is the first installment in a series of posts I’ll be making about Raph Koster’s The Laws of Online World Design, as explained in this introductory post. I will start at the top of the list, and work my way down until I’ve poked and prodded every law in the list, not skipping any unless I really feel like it.
In this, Part I of the series, I’ll concentrate on the following law:
Design Rules
Posted in Age of Conan, Games on Feb 20th, 2009
Another reward in the cabinet for the excellent music composer Knut Avenstroup Hagen: The IFMCA have just announced it’s 2008 winners for scoring excellence, and Knut was given the award of ” Best Original Score for a Video Game or Interactive Media” for his music score for Age of Conan. Congratulations, Knut! =)