On Fri, 2010-08-20 at 21:21 +0200, Michael wrote:
> - by "mise en abyme", I mean the idea that I was drawn to is the fact
> that you'd be playing online a game about being online.
In both cases you have it - "playing online a game about being online"
is a core concept of what we're trying to do, the blurring between
reality and fiction. For this, it doesn't matter if we are talking about
Gaia or AIs - the mechanism remains the same, you're behind your
computer, and you play the role of an Internet user.
> Okay, let me refine that: the Gaia concept is a bit too stretched for
> my tastes (and here I realize it is also a matter of taste, what we
> are drawn to, etc).
What do you mean by too stretched? Remember that it's still missing an
important component: the story.
> With the AI thing, you're on your computer, you start a game, you
> choose an avatar (not complexed at all - but then we can change that),
> it is contacted by an AI - first there would be some classic "meeting
> of two different cultures" fun, and some simulation time.
I won't say anything bad about what you've said about the potential of
AIs, because I like the AI theme, personally. : ) Or even the original
Hacker game. I could play both games, and have a lot of pleasure
developing them too.
However, discussions have shown that there was an important flaw to
those approaches - the fact that the potential demographics for those
games is hardcore players, and we need to have a concept that appeal to
a larger audience.
So, let's forget about the AI theme for now (unless, of course, if you
find new arguments that question the marketing objection!). If you
really don't like the Gaia theme, please feel free to suggest new themes
though - there isn't only Gaia and AIs ;p
> But very quickly. Because let's say you do 5 things for your AI and
> then bam: it opens some documents that show that it hasn't exactly
> contacted you by chance. It got your name from a bunch of documents...
> that show that you're about to get into some serious trouble real soon
> (a ticking clock for the tension).
This example of an action/mission could work well with both concepts.
The same can be said of most of the examples you take - they are actions
that you perform online, so they can be part of the game.
Also, even if it's linked, rather than gameplay mechanisms, it's more a
story that needs to be developed right now.
> The general idea goes - to me - further than the Gaia/environmental
> idea. It is knowledge (if you want to start by a quote, according to
> some translation, the first sentence of the Bible is not "At first God
> created Heaven and Earth" but "at first, God created the speech.")
> So through the battle over the internet, we can deal with the idea
> that nowadays Internet is our source of all our knowledge, our
> everlasting truth. What about when this truth is trying to be bent or
> even rewritten?
> Propaganda, ideology, it can go very deep... and very progressively.
Playing with knowledge is interesting yup! This is definitely something
that has its place in the storyline and the gameplay, if we find ways to
integrate it gracefully.
> - with the Gaia/spirit idea, I feel it is lacking of immediacy. And
> why would Gaia have to go through the Internet? And why would a spirit
> contact you through the Internet? You'd think they need something a
> little more tangible.
Sure! What would it be then? : )
That's the kind of things I'm looking for in the writer, someone who can
ask himself and answer these types of questions, to extend the concepts
and shape a meaningful story:
* The Gaia concept is lacking immediacy => Then how can we inject
some through the story?
* Why would a spirit contact you through the Internet? => Is there
a way to answer this through the story? If not, who should
contact the player then? Can't we replace the spirits entirely
by something else to fit the role?
Again, note that for now I'm not talking about the gameplay part, just
the story part. Those two are intertwined, so there will be a lot of
interdependencies - but I'd like to hear more about the story itself, we
haven't talked much about storyline so far.
> Plus, following the ideas of George Carlin (and Epictet, as a matter
> of fact): if the Earth has a conscience, we wouldn't be important, we
> wouldn't matter to it. We're a problem? Okay, send in a few
> hurricanes, a few tsunamis, a couple of plague. It should do the work.
> It wouldn't want to try to "moralize us". As capitalism, humans can't
> be moralized. It's the number one paradoxe: we're here because of the
> will to live. And with that comes the necessity to die. So if Earth
> would/could/should think, we wouldn't be much on its radar.
Again, rather than seeing this as a reason to not do the Gaia theme, can
you think of a way to incorporate George Carlin's argument in the
storyline? This can bring a lot to the story, and that's why I liked the
video so much. The Earth doesn't have to be moralizing to act in more
subtle manners than launching a few hurricanes...
> And also, with the idea of spirit, I found it a little silly. I see
> little elfs dancing around my computer, I don't like it. Well...
> actually it could be funny... but only for the stoner part of the
> game ;)
Sure, it is silly! It's a brainstorm, and this was an example to get you
something to bounce on. What would you replace this part with?
> PS: sorry I'm a retard but what do IMHO and ARG mean?
Sorry, I'm the one who should use less acronyms actually!
- IMHO means In My H* Opinion (with 'H*' meaning Humble, Holy or
Horrible depending on the context and the person using the acronym ;p)
- ARG means Aleternate Reality Game. Cf
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternate_reality_game
Xavier.
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