August 2003

• A potential best-seller? Richard A. Bartle
• Identifying Players Scion Altera
• • Identifying Players Crosbie Fitch
• Metrics for assessing game design David Kennerly
  Hey Adam,
  
  I apologize for taking so long to reply. I'm glad you posted it,
  and I think the principles you mentioned are worth considering.
  It's not what I usually think of when I think of "metrics," but I
  agree with three paragraphs of principles.
  
  Maybe I'm mistaking parlance. I would expect a metric to contain a
  standard unit of measurement that two independent experimenters
  could test for under identical conditions and both return identical
  results. And that, like the instructions of an algorithm, a
  metric's unit of measurement requires no cleverness to identify,
  only the proper detection equipment or procedure. All this could be
  added to what you wrote, but it seemed to me that that addition
  would be an immense amount of additional work.
  
  > P.S. About 50% of those who've dismissed this out of hand have
  > been professional games developers who felt that "of course it's
  > not possible to rate fun,
  
  Well, I'm not sure either way, before or after the reading the post.
  It's one thought to say that it is or is not possible to rate fun.
  It's a thousand more thoughts to say how. Personally, I don't care
  about the possibility of "rating fun" in theory, unless it is
  strictly impossible; I care about it in practice.
  
  Thanks a lot for the examples! They clarify your points. I enjoyed
  the Bomberman example. Right now, I'm still not sure I understand
  the application to the example of Bomberman "powerdowns".
  
  <http://www.kanga.nu/archives/MUD-Dev-L/2003Q3/msg00246.php>
  On Wed, 16 Jul 2003 10:07:46 +0100 Adam Martin wrote:
  
  > Worked examples:
  
  ...
  
  > Bomberman scores very on question one; every bomb re-shapes the
  > level (Which DOES matter because it alters how and where you will
  > meet your enemy). Even movement scores moderately well, because
  > of the slow speed of movement. Even choosing which powerup to
  > pick up scores well, because the fuse on bombs is so slow that
  > you have time to massively alter the effect of your bomb (by
  > picking up new powerups) before it goes off - and when you start,
  > the other player could be &ldquo;trapped, but safe&rdquo; but 3 seconds later
  > &ldquo;trapped, and about to die&rdquo;.
  
  > The framework/metrics above suggest that bomberman could be
  > improved by adding "powerdowns". These would increase the ability
  > to alter the available actions: they give you some potential
  > opportunity to "conserve" powerdowns in case you became trapped by
  > a combination of your own bombs and other people's. You could then
  > downgrade your bombs, enabling you to stand closer to your bomb
  > without being caught in the explosion, and possibly even providing
  > safe space for you to survive.
  
  There's a couple of things I'm unclear on. Primarily, how does the
  "framework/metrics above suggest that bomberman could be improved by
  adding 'powerdowns'"? Although I see your supporting evidence, I
  don't see a chain of derivation from the framework proposed linking
  to this example. There are many things that could satisfy the
  evaluation criteria that you listed. Why a powerdown in particular?
  
  The secondary point I'm confused on, which may be related to the
  primary, is the details of the powerdown. The Bombermans I've
  played have one bomb button and one directional pad (DC) / joystick
  (arcade), or arrows keys (PC). One of them, incidentally a Korean
  MMOG, does have a special button and does have special items not
  related to the usual Bomberman set. But for the most part the game
  was four directional movements (one of four directions on the grid)
  and one bomb placement button. That's a total of five keys on a
  keyboard. Only five. That's beautiful. So how does the powerdown
  get activated? Or, is it picked up like a powerup is picked up? It
  seems like this was not what you intended, because almost no player
  wants to pick up a blast range reduction after rushing around the
  board to grab as many blast range increases as possible.
  
  And then how does the powerdown work? Does it powerdown bombs that
  you have already placed? To what degree does it powerdown? Bombs
  come in a wide variety of blast range, depending on the number of
  flame powerups picked up. This blast range is critical for
  preventing an endgame stalemate between timid players. Otherwise it
  can often be a stale cat and mouse ending. Of course, there's other
  ways to solve this, but the powerdown as proposed as an isolatable
  improvement would reintroduce the problem that the powerups solve.
  
  Some of the excitement of bomberman is the problems you proposed
  that a powerdown would solve. It is precisely because one can be
  cornered into no safe place to survive that enables the masters of
  bomberman to make mortals of us all. This facet of the game design
  is enhanced by the inability to reduce bomb range. Because then the
  firepower up is not only a strategic advantage, it is a tactical
  test of how well the player can use the additional blast range. It
  kills either player equally well. Heated endgames of bomberman
  sometimes completely consist of masterful bomb placements. The lack
  of powerdowns rewards this skill mastery--to a good end, too.
  
  David
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