An old post to a great article by LostGarden

I was perusing once again one of my favorite blogs out there, http://www.lostgarden.com, and since he's recently re-tagged his entire blog and updated his directory listing, I was reviewing an old article Danc had written, called The Chemistry of Game Design (which was also featured on Gamasutra).

I like to read the comments the users post in response to his article, as Danc also tends to reply to these remarks, and I'd made a post with respect to his article that I had forgotten about and that I think is still worth noting. The link to the Wikipedia article about game design no longer features the Psychological Profiling section, but some googling about on your own should give you a nice insight on what you're looking for with regards to that.

Here's Danc's article:
http://lostgarden.com/2007/07/chemistry-of-game-design.html

Here's my post:

Great article Danc. A few things I noted, since I just got a chance to reading your article in its entirety:

Psychological Profiling / Player Model:

The player described in the player model is limited, in that it describes a specific subset of the set of players: those that are "driven," usually to learn or dominate (and to dominate, they must learn first). Due to the fact that a psychological model is called for, the player model described contains the following player subsets: Timmy Power gamers, Timmy Diversity, Johnny Combo, Johnny Offbeat, Johnny Uber, and all the Spikes, who, evidently, this player model is perfect for. [See Game Design in Wikipedia, specifically Psychological Profiling: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_design]

So what about the Timmy Social, Timmy Adrenaline, and Johnny Deck profiles? One could argue that they aren't the mainstream of gamers, because they aren't "hardcore" gamers - however, Timmy Adrenaline would disagree vehemently, as witnessed by DOOM3's and F.E.A.R.'s success, and The Sims is proof that Timmy Social is a very large demographic that can't simply be ignored. Johnny Deck's profile, in my honest opinion, represents those players that build or generate some sort of expression of themselves or their experiences in the game, such as a guild or clan, a house or empire, etc. And they're usually rooted into the other player profiles on some level as well.

The reason I mention this is to ask if maybe there isn't a player model that abstracts out a bit further to include a more involved psychological model. The purpose of your original abstraction was to focus on the core that is the player - but if the player is too loosely or too strictly defined, then it degenerates a critical component of the chemistry of game design. In this situation, the player is too strictly defined.

On that same note, I believe the Wiki should be updated to include your article on game design and your blog in general, as there is a wealth of game design information available here.

Pre-Existing Skills:

Shouldn't the general assumption be, of every game, only that a player cues in to the screen for some sort of visual feedback, and that they know that pressing buttons or moving analog sticks is supposed to do SOMETHING, as opposed to nothing? With this same thought process comes the need for every game to have at least a very simple tutorial, if not more involved for more complex games, which defines and describes the game controller and its general actions, and the capability to learn advanced skills by utilization of mastered basic skills, thus teaching even a non-gamer that mastery and utilization of certain skills leads to game advancement and skill advancement.

Most games today do provide a tutorial, but not all of them, and often times the "New Features" or "Tutorials" sections are nested into sub-menus that aren't necessarily clear in the first place (Example: Madden '08 by EA Sports). And in some cases, the tutorials are demonstration-based (see earlier: Madden '08, which provides nice video and audio tutorials showing exactly what to do) but don't allow the player to interact there directly to try a skill-set out and see if they can't get the basis for it down outside of actual gameplay instead of possibly trying it out during gameplay, messing up, and costing yourself time to re-load from a game death, etc. As such, these games are less effective in delivering the message to non-gamers or gamers who like directly to "jump into the action" and there's no built-in game-based tutorial. Obviously, advanced gamers may want to skip a built-in tutorial, and so they should be given that capability, just as newer gamers may want to listen/interact with the built-in tutorial and given that capability. (This goes with what you state in the Pre-Mastery of Skill Taught In The Game section regarding feelings of boredom and frustration for advanced players.)

Skill Atoms & Skill Chains: (Objectives, Future Topics)

Proposal: an artificial intelligence analysis framework, in comparison with the MDA game analysis framework for game analysis that you mentioned, that utilizes Skill Atoms and Skill Chains as they are progressed throughout the Player's Gameplay Life Cycle (as I like to call the fundamental game play, skill mastery and burnout flow described by your Chemistry of Game Design). If some sort of CGD architecture is built into the game itself and actively monitors a players partial mastery, full mastery and burnout of Skill Atoms, then it can eventually generate data by which an adaptable artificial intelligence can play against the player, allowing for variable levels of interaction and difficulty for the player, constantly providing a challenging stimulus without leading to frustration or boredom. Such information would be tremendously useful in any number of applications within the gameworld itself, and as a preferences experience for future game titles (and has numerable applications in the marketing world as well). In addition, this analysis could clue players into how using certain previously burned-out atoms may advance their skill-set later on during the game, by knowledge of their usage history with the skill atom in question and the necessity of learning the skill atom further down the chain for completion of their current objectives.

Just some food for thought. I do apologize that it took me as long as it did to read such an excellent article, and I'd love to hear your reply.

-Ahad

It's an interesting read, and my post reminds me of some of the more interesting notions I had regarding AI.

Take care,
Ahad L. Amdani