I'd call this "Introduce Yourself" but that always makes me feel pressured, so just come say hi!

[corvabird]

Hi!

I've been trying some new computer games, Rimworld and House Flipper. One is too stressful and the other is not stressful enough. It makes me realize how game design matters. o_o

Oh so true though. And I remember House Flipper! My brothers were briefly really into it but it didn't seem to have staying power (not enough stress, I guess!)

I think this is why a lot of games seem really exciting to me to begin with and then I just lose interest really quickly. Not hitting the right notes of conflict versus comfort (for me, anyway).

[corvabird]

I've been trying some new computer games, Rimworld and House Flipper. One is too stressful and the other is not stressful enough. It makes me realize how game design matters. o_o

cue a lengthy rant by Sion LOL

I would listen to a game design rant by Sion! XD

[corvabird]

Hi again xD

We're still gettin back into video games from having the comp set back up after moving, but I logged into fer.al for the first time in a while last week. What've you been up to in it?

Oh! How are things with the move?

And I hadn't played fer.al since maybe January until a few weeks ago when I suddenly really got into it! I finished all available quests and have been mostly working on expanding my house, as well as hanging out where there are lots of people and people-watching. I got invited to a race last week (though had to go before it started). And went on a group tour of people's sanctuaries which was fun too.

But mostly the house thing. Making my library very big, for nefarious secret purposes.

Oh also Jake just messaged today to say they got fer.al but our timezones are very different so I don't know whether I will catch them much.

(sorry for the very long fer.al talk)

[InspectorCaracal]

Hi again xD

We're still gettin back into video games from having the comp set back up after moving, but I logged into fer.al for the first time in a while last week. What've you been up to in it?

Oh! How are things with the move?

And I hadn't played fer.al since maybe January until a few weeks ago when I suddenly really got into it! I finished all available quests and have been mostly working on expanding my house, as well as hanging out where there are lots of people and people-watching. I got invited to a race last week (though had to go before it started). And went on a group tour of people's sanctuaries which was fun too.

But mostly the house thing. Making my library very big, for nefarious secret purposes.

Oh also Jake just messaged today to say they got fer.al but our timezones are very different so I don't know whether I will catch them much.

(sorry for the very long fer.al talk)

Yo don't apologize I literally asked for it lmfao!!

Ooooh, racing!! That sounds like a blast. I love it when people make their own gameplay in a game, so I'm super interested. Also I gotta check out your sanctuary at some point. Maybe we'll get a chance to get on tonight in between the minecraft modding and wrapping up the current GW2 festival.

The move is great! I mean, it's basically done now, we've still got some stuff out in the garage (it's wild, having a GARAGE, I've never had a garage before) that's in boxes because we haven't gotten all our furniture sorted yet, partly because J's not going back to the office yet so we have one room designated as his Home Office and things are still in flux. We ALSO got a CAR recently, it's a used electric but it's in amazing shape and it's so nice, I've named it Dyna

There's a bunch of house-stuff that's still gotta happen, we need to get a thing done in the crawl space for the radon mitigation and we need to get a bunch of electrical work done to bring things up to contemporary standards rather than 1970s standards or whenever it was last updated, and we didn't get anything planted this year but there's a whole bunch of nice stuff around and we've started working on the plants and shrubs and stuff, and it's soooooooooooo much easier to keep this place clean than the last crappy apartment so even with a couple Bug Panics everything's staying under control and things are going okay! We met some of the neighbors too and they're nice

[senbonzakura]

Hi!

I've been trying some new computer games, Rimworld and House Flipper. One is too stressful and the other is not stressful enough. It makes me realize how game design matters. o_o

Oh so true though. And I remember House Flipper! My brothers were briefly really into it but it didn't seem to have staying power (not enough stress, I guess!)

I think this is why a lot of games seem really exciting to me to begin with and then I just lose interest really quickly. Not hitting the right notes of conflict versus comfort (for me, anyway).

Game design is really tricky like that, because a lot of people making video games tend to assume that the same things are fun to the same degree for everyone, when in fact nobody has exactly the same preferences, tolerances and engagement points. That's why imo there's only two successful approaches to designing a game: knowing exactly what niche of gameplay you're aiming for and focusing on making it hit all the right points for that niche, or, tying together a widely flexible range of playstyles and mechanics. Essentially, specialization versus flexibility.

Beyond that, when it comes to player engagement at least, balancing investment levels and risk perception are the key points and they're really hard to get right, especially in multiplayer games. In singleplayer games, you can at least have difficulty modes - for example, in Minecraft, for people who get the most invested in high risk games, they can play on hardcore mode, with no respawn and maximum difficulty hostile creatures, while people who are invested by sense of progression but are put off by risk can play in Peaceful. And those who are invested by setting their own goals and freedom/flexibility and don't like risk at all can build things in Creative mode.

I don't know much about Rimworld, other than it's sort of like Dwarf Fortress, which makes me think they may have missed the roguelike design principle, Failure Is Fun. (Which is actually the titular principle behind Failbetter Games, who made Sunless Sea and Fallen London, which sometimes perplexes me because their entire philosophy appears to lend itself to losing being part of game design and progression and they completely failed to implement that in Fallen London. You can only progress by succeeding! There are some side-stories you can get to by failing at certain optional things, like getting into the madness world, but generally speaking, it goes straight into grindy progression and as a result easily loses engagement very quickly. ...But this is a tangent.)

Relatedly to all of this, though, I've always found it somewhat exasperating how many game creators try to manage the player investment through the game's metagame. Scoreboards, progression, numberchasing, et cetera. If more designers focused more on the actual gameplay being the fun and engaging part, they would have a lot more success.

[corvabird]

Hi again xD

We're still gettin back into video games from having the comp set back up after moving, but I logged into fer.al for the first time in a while last week. What've you been up to in it?

Oh! How are things with the move?

And I hadn't played fer.al since maybe January until a few weeks ago when I suddenly really got into it! I finished all available quests and have been mostly working on expanding my house, as well as hanging out where there are lots of people and people-watching. I got invited to a race last week (though had to go before it started). And went on a group tour of people's sanctuaries which was fun too.

But mostly the house thing. Making my library very big, for nefarious secret purposes.

Oh also Jake just messaged today to say they got fer.al but our timezones are very different so I don't know whether I will catch them much.

(sorry for the very long fer.al talk)

Yo don't apologize I literally asked for it lmfao!!

Ooooh, racing!! That sounds like a blast. I love it when people make their own gameplay in a game, so I'm super interested. Also I gotta check out your sanctuary at some point. Maybe we'll get a chance to get on tonight in between the minecraft modding and wrapping up the current GW2 festival.

The move is great! I mean, it's basically done now, we've still got some stuff out in the garage (it's wild, having a GARAGE, I've never had a garage before) that's in boxes because we haven't gotten all our furniture sorted yet, partly because J's not going back to the office yet so we have one room designated as his Home Office and things are still in flux. We ALSO got a CAR recently, it's a used electric but it's in amazing shape and it's so nice, I've named it Dyna

There's a bunch of house-stuff that's still gotta happen, we need to get a thing done in the crawl space for the radon mitigation and we need to get a bunch of electrical work done to bring things up to contemporary standards rather than 1970s standards or whenever it was last updated, and we didn't get anything planted this year but there's a whole bunch of nice stuff around and we've started working on the plants and shrubs and stuff, and it's soooooooooooo much easier to keep this place clean than the last crappy apartment so even with a couple Bug Panics everything's staying under control and things are going okay! We met some of the neighbors too and they're nice

Ah this is so exciting! I'm so happy for you omg! You have all the storage and a garden and eek! This is so cool! I mean I can see that getting the electrics done will be A Thing but I'm still so excited. House that is easier to keep clean is a huge deal.

Also Bug Panic is a mood. We had a Bug Panic a few weeks ago and just. No.

Also electric car wow :O Dyna sounds very fancy

Fer.al-wise, I will make sure my sanctuary is open for visitors so you can visit even if I'm not on. I'm very proud of what I've done so far!

[corvabird]

Hi!

I've been trying some new computer games, Rimworld and House Flipper. One is too stressful and the other is not stressful enough. It makes me realize how game design matters. o_o

Oh so true though. And I remember House Flipper! My brothers were briefly really into it but it didn't seem to have staying power (not enough stress, I guess!)

I think this is why a lot of games seem really exciting to me to begin with and then I just lose interest really quickly. Not hitting the right notes of conflict versus comfort (for me, anyway).

Game design is really tricky like that, because a lot of people making video games tend to assume that the same things are fun to the same degree for everyone, when in fact nobody has exactly the same preferences, tolerances and engagement points. That's why imo there's only two successful approaches to designing a game: knowing exactly what niche of gameplay you're aiming for and focusing on making it hit all the right points for that niche, or, tying together a widely flexible range of playstyles and mechanics. Essentially, specialization versus flexibility.

Beyond that, when it comes to player engagement at least, balancing investment levels and risk perception are the key points and they're really hard to get right, especially in multiplayer games. In singleplayer games, you can at least have difficulty modes - for example, in Minecraft, for people who get the most invested in high risk games, they can play on hardcore mode, with no respawn and maximum difficulty hostile creatures, while people who are invested by sense of progression but are put off by risk can play in Peaceful. And those who are invested by setting their own goals and freedom/flexibility and don't like risk at all can build things in Creative mode.

I don't know much about Rimworld, other than it's sort of like Dwarf Fortress, which makes me think they may have missed the roguelike design principle, Failure Is Fun. (Which is actually the titular principle behind Failbetter Games, who made Sunless Sea and Fallen London, which sometimes perplexes me because their entire philosophy appears to lend itself to losing being part of game design and progression and they completely failed to implement that in Fallen London. You can only progress by succeeding! There are some side-stories you can get to by failing at certain optional things, like getting into the madness world, but generally speaking, it goes straight into grindy progression and as a result easily loses engagement very quickly. ...But this is a tangent.)

Relatedly to all of this, though, I've always found it somewhat exasperating how many game creators try to manage the player investment through the game's metagame. Scoreboards, progression, numberchasing, et cetera. If more designers focused more on the actual gameplay being the fun and engaging part, they would have a lot more success.

I don't know these specific games but the Failbetter / roguelike design stuff here is fascinating. And that's a really good point about aiming for a niche or (in single-player) strong flexibility.

Thanks, Sion, for an interesting read this evening.

[Wysteria]

Oh, Rimworld definitely knows how to get you to enjoy failure - or to enjoy turning massive problems into good stuff. Like, one of my colonies has way too many chickens and they're eating all my grass, so the solution is to eat the chickens. Etc.

And then raiders kill everyone.

[corvabird]

I take it the problem is the raiders, then I had that problem with Viva Piñata (especially Viva Piñata 2). Like I was having plenty of challenge just from getting the piñatas I wanted and getting them to get along without killing each other but the Ruffians were almost too much for me (They just turn up and destroy stuff and you can't get rid of them). And then in the second game they were like 'You know what this game was missing? EVEN MORE CHALLENGE! Increase the Ruffians!' so I barely played the sequel

'Challenges' that are random, out of control, and massively set you back, are no fun at all.

[Wysteria]

To be clear, Rimworld is super fun. It's just also extremely stressful.