California Culture Shock?

Someone asked me recently what stage of culture shock I'm in now, three months after my move to San Francisco.

I'd say I'm in the Adjustment phase... ;) My transition has been pretty smooth - really, San Francisco is not that much different from Seattle, and the biggest differences have simply been a result of living on my own instead of with my parents. And I have to say, for the most part, these differences have all been quite positive!

I've surprised myself by how comfortable I am with solitude, when I have things to work on and toward. I do have a couple friends in the city, and I've been making friends at work, so I haven't been totally antisocial, but I have been spending the vast majority of my time alone and quite enjoying the mental space. It's also a nice improvement to live a block away from a grocery store, to have a kitchen all to myself as I learn to cook, to walk to work and back instead of taking a bus, and to be free of scheduled classes and volunteer duties.

In the couple weeks, work at Linden Lab has suddenly gotten a lot more interesting (and just in time, as it was starting to wear thin) as I have started focusing on a new project within Second Life and have finally learned enough that I can build with pieces I understand instead of slogging through a confusing mess, and so now my contribution and enjoyment is finally getting to that bend in the exponential curve. Still pushing the experimental stuff too - hopefully that will pick up in the next couple months as well.

And of course overall I have been appreciating the time I have around the edges now that I am no longer stuck in a cycle of alternating crunch and recovery from crunch. Many mental piles of clutter have been revisited and processed, many more to go, but still a promising sign. Over the past several weeks I have also been getting into developing the new version of Space Lord in an experience that has mirrored the development of the polished version of The Love Letter last year. Of course, as this means working hard at my day job and then eagerly coming home and working for several hours on Space Lord in the evening, I have not been getting as much sleep as I'd like. Still, I am very grateful for this opportunity - developing The Love Letter was one of the most enjoyable things I did all of last year. Space Lord may not be the perfect storm that The Love Letter proved to be, but it's been getting more and more interesting, and it's been nice polishing up my game jam backlog.

Right now, and I expect this to continue for several months more if not to the end of the year, my focus has been on getting things in order - trying to establish a sustainable routine, working through my mental backlog, dropping sources of friction like Google Reader, revisiting old projects. Fortunately, Linden Lab is the kind of place that is very flexible about a schedule where I go outside for a half hour of exercise before lunch, and a half hour of music practice for an afternoon break (perfect for refreshing my code-addled brain!). Like my sleep schedule, it's a work in progress and always in flux, but overall it's going in the right direction.

I have started doing some new things though - most notably, I took an introductory Parkour class this weekend for the first time! I can't believe I waited this long before trying Parkour - it's always been something I've thought would be a lot of fun, but never got around to actually doing. But now that I've started, it's obviously perfect for me. I can draw upon my previous experience with both Aikido and Capoeira, and it's something I can practice on my own time without having to find a partner.

So, I'd say it's going pretty well. I need more sleep though! Looking forward to getting Space Lord out there. :)

A Minor Flydrill Update

Not too long after my last Flydrill update, almost two years ago, I kept tweaking the game but never released anything after that.

Until now. :o

Don't get excited, it's just a tiny update. ;) I added white outlines to the enemies so you can see them better, with a slightly darker background color. I also made the giant wall thinner in the beginning. Honestly I was just tired of having to drill for ten full seconds every time I started the game. That's why I went ahead and released this update.

Flydrill

I guess it's spring cleaning time for me, polishing up and releasing old stuff I've had sitting around on my hard drive for the past year or two... :)

On that note, I noticed that Google Reader will be shutting down in a few months! :( As disappointing as that is, I think it's a good opportunity to revisit my content-consumption habits and perhaps let go of my daily blog reading. Looking through all my feed subscriptions, it strikes me how few blogs are still active - really there are less than a dozen that I see updates from regularly. And I've gotten to the point where none of the stuff I read is really that valuable to me - the game design articles are not blowing my mind with new insights, the productivity articles are teaching lessons that I've already learned, and really, I think I'd get a lot more out of spending that time working on actual projects or reading books or even... playing games. I mean, it's been years since I've really sat down and just played a game, for serious. I think the last one must have been Portal. Yeah. The truth is out! :o

Well, I hope you enjoy the Flydrill update! :) May there be plenty more to come, soon.

Oh, and I almost forgot - Happy Pi Day! :D

Active Sketch 07 - Quilt

Not only has my new job at Linden Lab been inspiring me to post more often, I've also been doing a lot more prototyping! :)

I used the platformer engine from my Ludum Dare game Ninjural Selection to make this infinite "quilt" of platformer levels. When you go off the edge of the screen, a new level is randomly generated and placed alongside for you to fall into.

Active Sketch 07 - Quilt

The levels are generated by randomly drawing and erasing horizontal and vertical lines of tiles, and then placing random emoticons for you to collect and avoid. But imagine what it would be like with fully featured platformer levels with roaming enemies and cool stuff to play with. Imagine that each level was created by another player - in fact, in this prototype you can already edit the platforms by holding shift and drawing with the mouse. Imagine that there were other players roaming around the quilt with you in real time, collecting coins with you or racing to find special items.

I think that could be pretty cool.

Active Sketch 06 - Runway

Almost two years ago I posted my last Active Sketch. The thing was, I had made another one around the same time that I never got around to putting online! So I decided it was time to finish it up and share it with you all.

It's a test of a one-button runner control scheme. I added new artwork, and random blocks to avoid.

Press and hold to run, let go to jump, and press again while in the air to fall faster.

Active Sketch 06 - Runway

Maybe not the next Canabalt, but I think it has a nice feel. :p The real challenge will be designing an environment that is fun with this control scheme - right now it's a bit too hard to avoid the blocks. I'd guess that it might actually be more fun if you were running on rooftops...

My first podcast appearance

I wanted to let you know that I had my very first podcast interview, and you can listen to it here, on the Critical-Gaming Network Blog!

KirbyKid had reached out to me a few weeks ago to see if I'd talk with him about my game Flydrill and the ideas about its mass appeal, or lack thereof, which I'd written about in an earlier blog post. I've been spending a lot of time lately listening to podcasts featuring conversations between indie developers, particularly my favorite, Infinite Ammo, so I thought it could be fun to try being in one myself. :)

And yeah, it was fun! I talked about Flydrill, and a bit about The Love Letter, and even a little bit of ranting on the attitudes behind typical free-to-play monetization schemes, which hopefully no one will quote me on. :p

The entire podcast is two hours long, but you can hear me starting at 04:35, and then snippets throughout until the interview segment concludes at 30:00. KirbyKid has interleaved interviews between myself and a mobile-social game developer named Matt Fairchild, so as he switches back and forth I end up representing the more gameplay-focused, "indie" side of things. Fine with me! :) It's funny hearing myself in a podcast - I used to hate hearing my own voice recorded and played back, but now I'm just intrigued by the unfamiliarity of it. Actually, I was very curious to listen so I could find out what I had actually said, because I had forgotten most of it! :p

Here's a quote from the podcast to give you a sense of it:

On the other hand, Alex is very concerned with gameplay, or games as art. He's focused on conveying information, guiding the player, and building systems that have meaningful interaction without cluttering the experience with leveling up, experience points, and other hooks that complicate what games are. Remember, there are common gameplay features that, when taken to an extreme, work against games as art. It seems that Alex is very aware of this balancing act in game design.

Unfortunately, KirbyKid has announced that he won't be doing any more podcasts, only three episodes in, because he can't afford to spend so much time on them. Well, I know how that is. But it's too bad.

Have a listen to my first podcast appearance!

Interactive Jane Austen Novels

Versu is an interactive storytelling platform just released today by Linden Lab.

Basically, I see it as Chris Crawford's Storytron, except done right. It's a collaboration between IF author Emily Short and AI expert Richard Evans, combining written stories with sophisticated character and drama AI. So far it's basically interactive Jane Austen novels (seriously!), but it can support any genre of fiction, and more stories (and the tools for making them) are on the way.

You can read Emily Short's description of it and see some quotes from the Linden Lab CEO Rod Humble if you want to learn more.

I first came across this when it was demoed at GDC (before LittleTextPeople was acquired by Linden Lab) and I've been eagerly waiting for it to come out. Unfortunately, right now it's only available for iPad, and I don't have one. :( But it sounds like it will be coming out for other platforms eventually.

I recently started working at Linden Lab myself, and this project is a big reason why. Can you imagine something more revolutionary being done right now? :D

So, here we have interactive experiences fueled on storytelling, not gameplay. Sign me up.

Oh, and I almost forgot - Happy Valentine's Day! :) No new game from me this year, sorry (I went for something a bit more... personal). You could always just play The Love Letter again... ;)

Water it down and burn it

Wow, I'm posting a lot more often than normal! I guess you can thank my new job at Linden Lab for that. :) We'll see how long this keeps up...

As far as I can tell, there are two types of games that people play for a long time: games that water down content and stretch it out through RPG grinding or FarmVille-style appointment systems, and games where you create. Okay, I guess there's a third - games with evergreen content complexity, like Triple Town, but these are very rare and I don't know of any very successful online games based on that principle.

World of Warcraft is the obvious example for games with lots of content, and even when it's watered down there is still a ton of it and it's very expensive to develop. FarmVille is an example that combines a thin layer of grinding with a thin layer of creativity. Minecraft is an example that combines a layer of grinding (harvesting resources) with a much deeper system of creation.

In all of these examples there is a social element as well, which is essential (even in Minecraft, minimal as it is), but even non-games have it (chat clients, forums, social networking sites) so I won't dwell on it here. Just keep in mind that the longest-lasting games tend to be social in some way.

In games with a creative element, like FarmVille and Minecraft, the grinding gameplay serves to give structure and ease the player into the creative play. As the player begins to tire of the grinding gameplay, the creative part is there to take up the slack. But the initial gameplay structure is essential to provide that hook and that ramp into the later experience.

In games where the creation experience is separate from the gameplay experience, there will be some players who only do creation and many more who only do gameplay. In this case you could set it up so the creators are providing gameplay content to the players. However, without watering the content down (with grinding), it is likely that the players will burn through content much faster than creators can create it. And because playing is separate from creation, most players who burn through gameplay will not transition to creation - they'll just leave.

I've imagined making a game where you create platformer levels like in N or Super Meat Boy, and earn points when other people play these levels and rate them highly. I still think that would be a cool idea, but I'm realizing that it would not work very well as an ongoing community experience. I doubt that anyone would spend months playing Super Meat Boy, as good as it is, while millions of people play games like FarmVille or World of Warcraft for a very long time. There's just not enough gameplay in a platformer to keep people going on level design alone.

But you could imagine a game where people create watery RPG content for other people, and where the creation and gameplay aspects are connected enough that there is a steady flow of players becoming creators. If you connect the creation and gameplay in a sloppy way, the two could collapse into each other, with people exploiting creation to farm gameplay progression (creating easy dungeons with gold everywhere and no monsters, for example). There could also be problems with finding appropriate content for players at various levels. But it should be possible to tune everything so it works as a self-sustaining ecosystem of playing and creating and moving between the two.

What would that look like?

Linden Lab and LEGO

Now that I'm working at Linden Lab, I'm spending a lot of time thinking about creativity software and discussing ideas, and sometimes I'll even come up with something worth sharing on my blog! :) Just keep in mind that this is me talking, and what I say here is not an official pronouncement from Linden Lab.

Talking with a coworker at lunch today, I realized that LEGO is a perfect example of sort of "shared creative spaces" that Linden Lab is trying to make. When it comes to LEGO, playing is creating, there is very little room on the pyramid devoted to pure consumption, shopping, or decorating - it quickly ramps on to full-blown creation. There is also very little inaccessible expert territory at the top - even the amazingly ambitious stuff that people create feels accessible, like you could have done that too if you put enough time into it. That's what "high skill floor, low skill ceiling" means.

And why is this? A significant part of it is that everyone understands LEGO bricks and how they fit together. Very little ramp-up is required to become fluent. Easy to learn, and well, pretty easy to master too. And yet it is not trivial. You can do so much with it, both in terms of building things and in terms of playing with the things that you build. It's important to remember that make-believe play with and within the things you build are also a significant part of the experience of LEGO. Most kids will spend as much time acting out imaginary adventures and battles as they do building them! Of course, different people will focus on different things - I happened to be more of a builder than a storyteller, but I still liked that my creations stood as evocative worlds that could imply stories or scenarios, whether or not I actually acted them out.

LEGO also excels at making the creation process fun in itself, as gameplay. I realized this when introducing a six-year-old to LEGO for the first time, examining my own experience with a game designer's eye. I discovered that building something with LEGO, especially building a model from instructions, is very similar to playing a hidden object game, in terms of the skills exercised.

To read LEGO instructions, which have no words, is to play a spot-the-difference game between the image of each step and the next, to see what has changed, identify the pieces involved, and imagine how you will put them there. You might not think that takes much skill at all, but you would be amazed at the performance gap between a six-year-old who has never seen LEGO instructions before and a twenty-something-year-old with an entire childhood of LEGO experience.

Similarly, once you know what pieces you want, you must play a hidden object game where you visually pick out the specific pieces from a cluttered jumble of dozens if not hundreds of other pieces, recognizing them from any angle, partially obscured or otherwise. I could see those pieces like an eagle spotting a mouse from high above the savannah, while my six-year-old apprentice took much longer, often to the point of giving up and asking for me to help.

Then of course there is the mechanical process of snapping the pieces together, which is not very sophisticated, as far as gameplay goes (though try teaching a robot to do that!) but is still a skill to be learned, and has a very satisfying payoff (click!).

This all may seem trivial, and not worth thinking about, but when you are making a digital game, you don't get any of this for free. Dragging an image onto another image is not equivalent to mechanically snapping in a plastic spear into a plastic hand, and choosing a brick from a menu is not equivalent to searching for a brick in a jumbled pile on the floor. I think it's very much worth thinking about.

The interesting thing is, while we're making comparisons with spot-the-difference and hidden-object gameplay, I actually find building with LEGO more fun than the computer games that cater exclusively to this activity. To me, searching for a LEGO piece that I can actually then use to build with is so much more interesting and rewarding than searching for a random piece of junk in a list in a hidden object scene that I will end up using in an arbitrary puzzle in a generic mystery adventure story. I think creative tools can be more fun than those things we call strictly "games", at least for people like me, and I don't think we should shoot for anything less.

Making games, not excuses

At the last minute, I've decided to accept the challenge of #OneGameAMonth. It's time to make games, not excuses.

What a great tagline.

Anyway, here I am on the site! I'm already a Level 6 Game Developer - cool, huh? :)

Not much on there yet, just the game I made for Global Game Jam 2013, which I haven't yet shared with you here because it's crude and unpolished. :p But it is complete, which is more than I can say for most other game jam games I've made.

Probably helped that we made it by modifying the code for The Love Letter, which incidentally is on GitHub, in case you missed it. ;)

Here's to making many more games this year! :D