quote: Original post by JackNathan
What would be the goal of playing anyone but a state leader?

In our world today, there are many positions rapidly becoming more powerful than states - multinational corporations that deal with a multitude of nations and their laws, and "rebel" organizations that consider themselves above and/or outside the law. Consider that about 6 of the 10 largest economies in the world today are corporations, not countries. All this makes it both attractive and interesting to be a (big) businessperson or political revolutionary (take a look at Yasser Arafat, or - as much as we dislike the fact - Osama bin Laden).

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The state leader in typical games would be trying to take over the world. But what would the goal be for the ''lesser'' players? It seems like the same problem with MMORPG''s, everyone wants to be the hero, so you need NPC''s to run the shops and inns. That''s why I phrased the idea of the press as more of an NPC.

In RPGs everyone wants to be the hero because that''s the only way to amass the game''s core currencies - reputation, magic and combat skills. In this game, the core currency is power, and there are many, many conceivable ways to amass power. Power also exists at several scopes - the local businessman, the state senator, the congressman, the president, the "Freedom Fighter", the international peace activist...

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Another thought, if you have human players in many different roles, the interface is going to need to be very flexible.

Text between players. Text commands (with player macros). Images representing what''s going on. Simple, yet utterly flexible.

Everyone plays games to win! So the question is how exactly will a winner be found. And since the conflict is for power the question becomes, how do you measure it? In the real world, Power is directly related to the amount of resources being controlled by a person. As distinct from those being influenced by him(or her). For instance CNN is a very influential organisation but the 'power' of Ted turner is measured by how much money and property he has. And if he tries to put some sort of spin on what is being reported to his own gain It will be to gain more of one or the other of these resources.

In my mind this brings two issues,
One is that some sort of resource management will definitely have to play a very basic role in it as all the wheeling and dealing will have to be able to translate directly or indirectly to a measurable resource(or a set of measurable resources). As in AlphaCentuari(which is the best politics game I've seen) when you start you imagine it's like any other RTS (or Turn-Based Strategy) and start building bases and armies, but almost immediately you start a war the economic and manpower expenditure sends you to the bottom of the ranking. The only implementation of what we're discussing I can think of will involve something similar, where the player goes in believing he's in a standard RTS but finds out that without access to relevant information he can't expand his holdings at the same rate as his competitors.
Two is that very few players will be interested in taking any positions that don't seem to have a direct line to the top. In one of MY "million dollar" ideas I imagine having a world fully populated by NPCs, of course AI is always bad at wheeling and dealing so as players join the world they will quickly depose any NPC in the position they want (one way or the other ) and set themselves up in his place. Also, people need to have servants of some sort. The truth is that it is very unlikely there will be no dead end jobs in this world and the easiest staff to find for a dead end job is a robot(spelt NPC). Of course in a high tech world these jobs could be done by real robots.

Shucks I've forgotten what else I was going to say. That's what you get for watching tv while typing

[edited by - thelurch on October 28, 2002 5:39:54 PM]

quote: Original post by thelurch
Everyone plays games to win!

No, everyone plays games to be entertained, to be satisfied. They may win - and winning my bring greater satisfaction - and they may lose, but as long as it is entertaining it''s all good.

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And since the conflict is for power the question becomes, how do you measure it? In the real world, Power is directly related to the amount of resources being controlled by a person. As distinct from those being influenced by him(or her).

I disagree. The resources one influences are oftentimes many orders of magnitude larger than those one controls, and often equally more important. Consider the office of the president of the United States of America, widely considered to be the most powerful post in the world. While America has a huge economy and military, it is America''s influence - direct and indirect - that makes it such a world power. Yes, having the world''s largest arsenal of nuclear weapons bestows a not-insignificant amount of power on America, but it is it''s influence on political and economic arbitration bodies (NATO, G8, UN, etc) that is most powerful.

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For instance CNN is a very influential organisation but the ''power'' of Ted turner is measured by how much money and property he has. And if he tries to put some sort of spin on what is being reported to his own gain It will be to gain more of one or the other of these resources.

If Ted Turner were able to subvert or slant the news to favor a certain political figure when asked, then that political figure (and very likely many others) will be indebted to Turner, increasing his influence several orders of magnitude. You might argue that a man who already controls the world''s most ubiquitous news channel doesn''t need such influence: even CNN is still regulated by certain laws; this way Turner can have the laws bent to profit his company.

Your ideas on practicalizing this concept are interesting, but I think you''re still too close to the traditional (or even exceptional) RTS view of things (resources, command hierarchies, measurable game objects).

Someone correct me if I''m wrong.

*HTTP 500
*HTTP 500

Oluseyi totally and completely gets it.

I love it.

Please let the discussion continue...

Maybe another way of phrasing what I''m getting at is what would the goals be for the non-state leaders? For that matter, state leaders shouldn''t always be out to conquer the world. Modern democracies are more interested in a stable world environment. But back to the original point, what would be the goal for the press or a business? If it''s just to acquire power, where does it end? Does the megacorp have to own the government?

I do have a few ideas for a solution. Scenarios should have a time limit and set goals at the beginning. Perhaps the player even chooses his goals and maybe they should be hidden from the other players. At the end of the game everyone is scored based on what the achieved. I''ve also thought of a few goals for the non-nation players. A newspaper may want to achieve dominent market share or advance a certain ideology, business may want to reach a certain size or amount of money, and they could cut deals with governments. Governments may want to advance ideologies instead of conquering militarily ( ie the US promoting democracies around the world ) I think you''d need multiple players in each category. In essense, this would make many parallel games taking place with each category more or less only competing against themselves, but all the games taking place in the same environment and affecting each other.

I''m beginning to really like this idea!

Jack

I envision a more openended gameplay - with no defined ending point. Regarding the press, just because a player becomes head of a media corp, does not mean they have slotted themselves into that role. They are free to pursue whatever else they want, or transition into a new role if they want.

The motivation to play, other than to have fun, is to watch how you can exert your will into the game world/universe. I can''t think of any other way to put it. At any given time, nobody is clearly the winner, but simply more capable and effective at influencing the world, just like the real world. Those who are ''winning'' know it, by the simple fact that they are movers and shakers in the game world/universe. In other words, no score determines if you are a winner, but rather the collective dynamics of the game world react when you play your hand, be it a media play, an energy play, a war play, a political play, whatever.

quote: Original post by bishop_pass
I envision a more openended gameplay - with no defined ending point. Regarding the press, just because a player becomes head of a media corp, does not mean they have slotted themselves into that role. They are free to pursue whatever else they want, or transition into a new role if they want.

The motivation to play, other than to have fun, is to watch how you can exert your will into the game world/universe. I can''t think of any other way to put it. At any given time, nobody is clearly the winner, but simply more capable and effective at influencing the world, just like the real world. Those who are ''winning'' know it, by the simple fact that they are movers and shakers in the game world/universe. In other words, no score determines if you are a winner, but rather the collective dynamics of the game world react when you play your hand, be it a media play, an energy play, a war play, a political play, whatever.

Maybe it''s just one of those things that would appeal only to certain types of gamer. I''m not much of a fan of the extremely open-ended game with no goals like SimCity. I''m seeing it as more of a Civilization or 4X game with the focus on the political realm.

Jack

quote: Original post by bishop_pass
In other words, no score determines if you are a winner, but rather the collective dynamics of the game world react when you play your hand, be it a media play, an energy play, a war play, a political play, whatever.

But you did mention a voting system which creates a list which orders people by ranking. Is this system no longer to be used? Or is this system only a facade which is ignored by those who have true power?

So what are our goals and what are some means to achieve them?

1) Goal: Don't kill the newbie. Poor players as well as weak players (joining late in the game or having suffered severe defeats) should still be able to make a difference. Defeated or bankrupt players with good names will make a living again.

Means:
- players are resources. the simple presence of a player will increase economic output, military efficiency, and so forth
- the production means of a single player should be limited. For instance a player can at most exploit a single solar system or a single planet.
- vast opportunities for expansion. Conflict can still exist for the better places (resources (Middle East - like) or as position (California)), but for the poor settler there's always a Wild West ready to be colonized.
- "The one who really controls something is the one who can destroy it" (Dune) Destroying a player's base should be a lot easier than capturing it intact. A player should have the choice to permanently destroy certain special features of his base.
- base. All players have a significant military advantage near their base (think Afghanistan or Vietnam). Blockading and negotiating should be a lot easier and less costly than an all-out attack.

2) Cooperation. From the (in-game) moral point of view, the average player is a cross between Genghis Han and Hitler. The game rules must ensure the dominance of the cooperating players against the chaotic ones so the game doesn't degenerate into a feudal chaos.
- specialization pays. Investing in a certain domain and neglecting others then relying on trade is the fastest way to create a dependency web between players.
- perks. Different players should have different advantages (military, economic, scientific bonuses; certain unique technologies (Death Star plans); psychic abilities; artifacts that can convert resources; rare resources)

3) Negotiation as opposed to direct conflict.
- war is costly. A player can afford to fight perhaps 10% of the game time unless he is backed up by allies. Preparing for war takes time. Bringing an army from the standby status to the alert status takes time and money. Keeping a large army on alert costs a lot too. Negotiating a way out of a conflict is often a good idea. Negotiating an end to an unprofitable war is often a good idea.

4) Intelligence. Knowing the intentions or capabilities of a player should be vital for profitable negotiations.
- any infrastructure or ship, can have options to hide (cloaking devices, radio silence, increased security). Each of these options can have disadvantages (costs or access). The failure to find information on a certain target or finding out about attempts to obtain cloaking technologies may raise unwanted questions.
- active scanners vs. passive scanners. The latter can be combined with stealth tactics, the first with a mighty armada.
- incomplete information. A passive scan may only obtain estimated mass and energy emissions, while an active scan may show cargo contents, weapon systems, etc. Spies infiltrated in different structures can offer specific information (military exercises at military bases, resources loaded or unloaded at a starport, sightings of new fighters, production quantities etc.) Combining information from multiple sources can create a complete image.
- double spies. Once a spy is discovered, the player has a choice to whether he wants to eliminate the spy or feed him false information or force him to send false data. If out of 20 bases three have known spies, ordering only those bases on alert (or on standby) can fool an enemy.

5) Globalization. Events that affect all players are needed to keep the game world from breaking in separate unrelated games.
-fractal resource distribution. The most common resources can be found on all worlds (food, etc.). The frequency of the noise distribution function of different resources should change a lot, so that the rarest of the resources can only be found in a single place in abundant quantities. Local conflicts for common resources are gradually replaced by higher level conflicts for control of the more exotic resources.
- perks again. Special abilities obey the same distribution laws as resources. Perhaps only one player can train elite spies, train elite troops, build Death Stars, create artificial worm holes, etc. The more common the ability is, the more often it can be found around.

6) Personal power.
- I don't want the average usual type power growth (in Civilisation, ones power grows million of times), but leading player should enjoy some benefits. Taxes from lesser players may allow them to continuously train their troops, and constantly keep them on alert, and pay them a lot. They can have the best equipment, buy the best specialists and so on and so forth. The limited size of the army and of the economy does not root out direct personal power. A leading player may thank his subjects for his power, but his subjects can't just leave when they choose to.

7) Historic meaning. If done right, this game should allow scenarios that mimic various historic events. Total wars, revolutions, dictatorships, democracies, corruption, chaos, perhaps even a Cold War.


[edited by - Diodor on October 29, 2002 11:34:51 AM]

Some thoughts on the game interface and communications between players:

Perventing players from using email, irc or other non-interceptable communcation methods is impossible, even if you restrict in-game communication to predetermined phrases. Players would just use the first letters of the phrases or even numeric ASCII codes to transmit their email addresses. Such ban would only lead to situation where players are constantly accusing each other of cheating and not enjoying the game.

I would take a completely diffrent approach on in-game communcations: Give players everything that modern internet offers and more, integrated to the game client: public and private irc-channels, forums, email and even homepages. The game server should obviously keep logs of all these for players who aren''t online when great things happen.

Public forums would be a great place to announce deals and alliances, for example:
Player A would post: "I have signed a non-aggression treaty with player B that will last to the year 3042." Player B would then post a reply stating that player A''s claim is true.

Homepages could be used for advertising players services: "For most effective radar and psi-sensor equipment in quadrant E5, email me".

Players should also be able to easily transmit ingame screenshots, maps and reports between each other, but all these should be easily alterable. For example while viewing the main map player A could press the "Take screenshot" button which would transform the ingame GUI to something that very much resembles a vector drawing program. She could then drag icons representing a couple of her warships away from the vulnerable asteroid mining station operated by player B. The game would then restore the original interface and take a screenshot of the modified map. Player A could then send the screenshot to player B to assure that she is definetly not planning to break their treaty.

IMO there shouldn''t be a way to transfer information about players ingame state to other player(s) without the abiblity to alter or forge that information. There shouldn''t be a "Share map with other player" option or anything like that, just like there shouldn''t be any way to make deals or alliances that can''t be broken.