Hi Tom.
the same debacement of coinage happened over here, indeed part of the reason
Britain's currency became metric in 1978, revaluing the pound to be 100
pence instead of 240, despensing with many of the old coins such as
shillings, half and quarter pennies, gold sovereignes, crowns, guinnies etc
was debacement of the coinage in the way you describe.
These days all british coins are pretty base metal, and the only gold in the
currency exchange is that found in the exchecker to maintain the gold
standard upon which the value of the coinage is worked out external to the
stock markit.
However in game terms, sinse you are dealing with an abstract system outside
of other factors, actual value of gold doesn't matter, just as when you buy
a sword in an rpg game that costs say 10 gold, that 10 ggold only has value
according to the internal economy of the game, (there's no way these days
that any sword would be worth 10 gold coins).
Most puzzle games indeed don't use real money at all, in fact the only
reason i can think of that Draconis decided change reaction should be based
upon real coins was to give players the familiarity of playing a game with
coins they were used to physically handling in everyday life.
Sinse however that familiarity doesn't exist for people outside the us, you
might as well! go abstract into some game only denomination such as coins
made of silver and gold, indeed for myself and other people who do not have
any clear idea what an american knickle or a dime or whatever looks like,
such an abstraction would be easier to handle sinse we could fill it with
our own expectations about the physical nature of coins.
for example, i might imagine silver coins in the game as silver versions of
English ten pence peaces, and gold coins like the shorter, heavier pound
coins we're used to over here, (that do have a bronzey tint to them), where
as you or other American players might imagine gold and silver dollars.
that is why i think abstract, in game referencial coinage might be a better
option than just trying to pander to ever country's denominations.
though then again, given the current exchange rate, if pounds were
introduced to the game it would mean britissh players could make a lot more
money for exploding the same number of coins :d.
Beware the grue!
dark.
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