October 2004
- intellectual history T.L. Taylor
- intellectual history Mike
- Text-tospeech (Was Shift in time) Mike Rozak
- Text-tospeech (Was Shift in time) Mike Rozak
- [NEWS][BIZ] China to limit online gaming Ghilardi Filippo
- TECH: Punkbuster type technology and why we don't see any big name MMOG's using it David Wright
- ADMIN: Attitude, this list, and moderation J C Lawrence
- (no subject) Unknown
- PvP and teamspeak? Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- PvP and teamspeak? Victor Wachter
- PvP and teamspeak? Corey Crawford
- PvP and teamspeak? Brian Hook
- PvP and teamspeak? Victor Wachter
- PvP and teamspeak? Ghilardi Filippo
- PvP and teamspeak? David Johansson
- PvP and teamspeak?
- PvP and teamspeak? Douglas Goodall
- PvP and teamspeak? Matt Mihaly
- PvP and teamspeak? Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- PvP and teamspeak? Matt Mihaly
- PvP and teamspeak? Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- PvP and teamspeak?
- PvP and teamspeak? Matt Mihaly
- PvP and teamspeak? Corey Crawford
- PvP and teamspeak? Ling Lo
- PvP and teamspeak? Dana V. Baldwin
- PvP and teamspeak? Cosmik
- PvP and teamspeak? Cosmik
- PvP and teamspeak? Mike Rozak
- PvP and teamspeak? Corey Cauble
- PvP and teamspeak? Ghilardi Filippo
- Text-to-speech (Was Shift in time) Mike Rozak
- Why do smart people grind? ceo
1. Because you want to play a game, and a game requires challenge,
and there's nothing challenging about solving mind-numbingly boring
problems. Mind-numbing can be achieved several ways:
overly simplistic
(e.g."type the numbers 1 to 100 in reverse order")
highly repetitive
(e.g. a sliding-puzzle, like the one most of us have played
hundreds or thousands of times before in our youth, hence this
has no interest to us)
overly complex
(e.g. "you have 150 levers, and you have to get them into the
right combination using feedback that is delayed 7 moves from
when it occurred [ARGGHG!]")
You want to be a powerful butt-kicking warrior, or a fancy-pants
mage, but you know that just entering a game and immediately being
God is no fun at all (although perhaps you don't understand why).
Obviously, you can't (mainly) be put through physical pain, nor be
required to spend 50 years of your life building up skills, or spend
hours pumping iron. But...you can be forced to grind, which has a
lot in common with those things. You can suffer for the advancement
of your character, be forced to make real-life sacrifices (time) of
a variable magnitude in order to advance your character ("according
to commitment" you might say - in comparison to the financial cost,
$10 a month, which is "a level playing field").
So. Perhaps level-grind is the hardship we willingly submit to in
order to feel we've achieved something. I don't know about you, but
when I sat back and looked at my level 50-something characters I
certainly felt achievement - and it had nothing to do with
discovering new lands (each of which could have had a sign like:
"Welcome to the Lost Plains. You are visitor number 45,736"). Nor
did it have anything to do with strategy, as confirmed by looking at
some of the painfully stupid people who were at a similar level, yet
appeared quite genuinely to have played their way to that point. Nor
even did I feel an accomplishment of skill; the players I'd trod on
on my way up had been mere minor diversions - to be honest, I can't
say I could even remember a single thing about more than one or two
of them (there were a few that were truly special, for instance the
Diablo2 Sorceress of a much hgiher level who challenged me to a
duel, clearly aiming to freeze me and then kill me at her leisure,
with me screaming "no fair"; only, I happened to have a very rare
belt of "invulnerability to freezing", and guessed the scam, so
accepted - and she died quickly, smugness flowing to disbelief and
then rapidly to vicious curses...Another griefer griefed :D).
But I certainly felt proud that I'd stuck with it all that way -
that was an achievement in itself. I'd learnt and re-learnt tactics
for each scenario to maximise my levelling speed, and demonstrated
at least some skill in reducing the interminable boredom of
levelling to the least boring as possible (but still enough to make
one miserable), and carefully paced the addictiveness, so that I was
able to keep playing and *actually enjoying it* whilst knowing,
really, that I was doing something pointless, unchallenging, and
dull.
Just a thought.
Adam M - Why do smart people grind? Geoff Hollis
- Why do smart people grind? Matt Mihaly
- Why do smart people grind? Miroslav Silovic
- Why do smart people grind? ghovs
- Why do smart people grind? Oliver Smith
- Why do smart people grind?
- Why do smart people grind? neild-mud@misago.org
- Why do smart people grind? Kirinyaga
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Brett Bibby
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Cosmik
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Mike Rozak
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Russ Whiteman
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Matt Mihaly
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Ted L. Chen
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Per Magne Bjørnerud
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Paul Canniff
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Mike Rozak
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design darksuit
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Dana V. Baldwin
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Sean Kelly
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Richard A. Bartle
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Mike Rozak
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Richard A. Bartle
- [SPAM] DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Dana V. Baldwin
- [SPAM] DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- [SPAM] DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Tess Snider
- [SPAM] DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Byron Ellacott
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Damion Schubert
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Mike Rozak
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Damion Schubert
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Corey Cauble
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Amanda Walker
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Mike Rozak
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Dana V. Baldwin
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Mike Rozak
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Dana V. Baldwin
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Dana V. Baldwin
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Corey Cauble
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Douglas Goodall
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Brett Bibby
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Douglas Galbi
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Ted L. Chen
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Douglas Galbi
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Richard A. Bartle
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Tess Snider
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Lost Penguin
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Mike Rozak
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Mike Rozak
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Dana V. Baldwin
- DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Damion Schubert
- Newsweek prints an article reguarding the selling of virtual currency Chris
- Newsweek prints an article reguarding the selling of virtual currency Chris
- Cheating in the world Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- Cheating in the world Matt Mihaly
- Cheating in the world Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- Cheating in the world Matt Mihaly
- Cheating in the world Matt Mihaly
- Cheating in the world Michael Hartman
- Cheating in the world Michael Hartman
- Cheating in the world Paul Schwanz
- Cheating in the world Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- Cheating in the world Paul Schwanz
- Cheating in the world Damion Schubert
- Cheating in the world Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- Cheating in the world Matt Mihaly
- Cheating in the world Matt Mihaly
- Cheating in the world Dana V. Baldwin
- Cheating in the world Ted L. Chen
- Cheating in the world Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- Cheating in the world Matt Mihaly
- Cheating in the world Shannon Sullivan
- Cheating in the world Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- Cheating in the world Shannon Sullivan
- Cheating in the world Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- Cheating in the world Fred Snyder
- Cheating in the world Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- Cheating in the world Zach Collins (Siege)
- Cheating in the world Miroslav Silovic
- Cheating in the world Corey Cauble
- Cheating in the world Shannon Sullivan
- Will players pay for public services? Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- Will players pay for public services? ceo
- Will players pay for public services? ceo
- Will players pay for public services? Matt Mihaly
- Will players pay for public services? Hans-Henrik Staerfeldt
- Will players pay for public services? Hans-Henrik Staerfeldt
- Indies unite? Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- Indies unite? Mike Rozak
- Indies unite? Mike Rozak
- Indies unite? Boris Triebel
- Indies unite? Dana V. Baldwin
- NEWS: Oblivion RPG's (next version of Morrowind) NPC AI Mike Rozak
- NEWS: Oblivion RPG's (next version of Morrowind) NPC AI Mike Rozak
- BIZ: Europe & Distrubution Johan
- BIZ: Europe & Distrubution Matt Mihaly
- BIZ: Europe & Distrubution Daniel James
- R: BIZ: Europe & Distrubution Valerio Santinelli
- BIZ: Europe & Distrubution Dana V. Baldwin
- BIZ: Europe & Distrubution HRose
- BIZ: Europe & Distrubution Vincent Archer
- BIZ: Europe & Distrubution Johan
- BIZ: Europe & Distrubution Matt Mihaly
- BIZ: Europe & Distrubution Tamzen Cannoy
- BIZ: Europe & Distrubution Ghilardi Filippo
- [OT] Europe & Distribution Ben Carter
- BIZ: Europe & Distrubution Ghilardi Filippo
- BIZ: Europe & Distrubution ceo
- BIZ: Europe & Distrubution Michael Hartman
- BIZ: Europe & Distrubution HRose
- BIZ: Europe & Distrubution Dana V. Baldwin
- BIZ: Europe & Distrubution Erik Bethke
- BIZ: Europe & Distrubution Bloo
- BIZ: Europe & Distrubution Per Vognsen
- [OT] Hi all an first time MMORPG designer tries to get in the loop Sam Byard
- [SPAM] DGN: Effect of voice chat on game design Tess Snider
- MEDIA: Chris Crawford on Interactive Storytelling Mike Rozak
- Sweatshops? Tess Snider