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The Player's Bill of Rights
Gamasutra has a Designer's Notebook column up this week offering up a Player's Bill of Rights. Written by Ernest Adams, the article decries the many indignities that we as players should never be forced to suffer. From the article: "The Right to Feedback: The player has a right to know how she's doing, and in particular, to some means of determining if she's in danger of losing the game. If the player doesn't get feedback, she can't adjust her strategy, and the outcome will feel random. Players need to know whether their approach is working or not."
This and other bills are too long. I think that all of the points in all of these bills will be addressed if we only get the right to
(0) Return a game for a full refund if we do not like it.
I just knew someone would reply like this. Look at what website this is posted on. Look at the name of the column. Now, actually read the article.
It's not a list of demands to game companies. It's some tips for game designers, like pretty much everything on GamaSutra.
LOAD "SIG",8,1
I disagree with that "right"--I still can't believe I'm replying to a post about a Player's Bill of Rights, only on slashdot. In some games, insulting and being insulted by NPCs is an important part of the game. Take Neverwinter Nights as an example. Depending on whether or not an NPC insults you or is ill-tempered, you might make different choices, ultimately causing a different outcome. Likewise, if you insult an NPC they may not be very helpful, which could change the outcome as well. Overall it was a good list of what should(n't) be done in a game. I especially liked the Right to Control Cut-Scenes, that's a must-have.
-William Brendel
No, it's intended to mean that the author cannot accept the possibility that "he" is essentially geneder neutral in English.
or even better "to some means of determining if they're in danger of losing the game."
The only things certain in war are Propaganda and Death. You can never be sure which is which though
The points forwarded in the article are mere childsplay. For the most part, game designers have been doing all of these things for years; we're talking standard fare. Individual games and genres tend to suffer differently in these cases, but I don't think the problem is as rampant as the author makets it out to be. Right not to be insulted? I've never played a commercial game worth a lick that was like that; the best example they could come up with was a cell phone clone of minesweeper? Apparently this is not such a big problem.
Instead of focusing on things that games ALREADY do, I'd rather like to see some rights that consumers need such as the right to fresh, creative content. It seems like the most popular games today are sequels and/or rehashes of old game engines and ideas. Where's the excitement?
Also, gamers should have the right to OWN their games. That's right folks; they should be able to pay once and get a full copy, preferrebly with source. Along with this goes the right to play your game; I own dozens of Windows and DOS games that are no longer playable on my current systems. More games should be liberated so that we can port our treasured games and continue playing them.
See, now we're talking about rights, not this "I can't figure out what the buttons for my game" nonsense.
Likewise, game designers should not needlessly impair the player's progress. Designers should keep the characteristics of the player-character in mind and design environments accordingly. If I am playing a fireball-hurling Mage, a wooden chest should not prove too difficult for me to open, key or no key. If I am playing a human, when confronted by a waist-height fence, I should be able to hop over it if I choose instead of worrying about the silly lock. (That doesn't mean I shouldn't be looking over my shoulder when I get to the other side, watching for dogs, guards, or laser turrets.) Any player should be able to ask, at any time, "Well, why can't I do this?" and receive a better answer than "Because you're not supposed to do it that way" (e.g. "Because you won't fit there" or "Because you'll die"). Being blocked by an invisible wall for no apparently good reason is frustrating and insulting. Put some thought into it and make a game that we can get into.
Information wants to be anthropomorphized!
Software generally has a return policy of a) no returns if it's opened or b) exchange for the exact same title (to protect against defective media).
OK, so how many exchanges for the same title does it take to convince a store that every copy of a given work will be defective in the same way?
could easily be "to some means of determining if the player is in danger of losing the game."
This sounds a bit awkward if used repeatedly.
or even better "to some means of determining if they're in danger of losing the game."
Inelegant. The player is not plural so should not be referred to as "they".
From the first right: >>The majority of the time a player spends in a game, he should be making decisions, exploring, creating, overcoming challenges, or otherwise acting upon the game world in some way. Players come to play, not to watch cut-scenes. Notice that I say the majority of the time. Non-interactive elements are not forbidden, but they should not take up more than 50% of the playing time of the game.
Maybe I'm the minority, but I like cut-scenes. I play games instead of watching movies or TV. While I enjoy action games, I love JRPGs that have hours and hours of cut-scenes, and I really wouldn't notice if the cut-scenes took up more than the 50% of the game (though I usually do all the sidequests, so I highly doubt even close to the time I spend is half cutscenes). I could even imagine a developer making a RPG-like game that didn't have battles, just exploring and cut-scenes for non-gamers. My point is that people like different things, and that as a group demanding that games have a limit to cut-scenes is about as pointless as demanding no more Ecco the Dolphin games. If you don't like it, don't buy it, but trying to stop if from being made makes no sense at all.
Of course, it's not like this matters as all, this article will be forgetten by the time the next thing is posted on slashdot (or it will be the next thing posted on slashdot), but I just felt like giving out my two cents.
"What is Internet Explorer 7? Are you saying we can't access the normal internet?" - I love tech support. Really.
"The Right to Play." - Taste is like the bottom on this one (split). If the game promises gameplay and only have "intermission" videos then I'll be disappointed, but if I like stories and the game promises that I might enjoy it just like I enjoy a movie.
"The Right to Win." - I guess most of the offenders here are old shooter games with 100 or 255 levels of invading pixly monsters. Not sure if I have seen it in any new (big) games.
"The Right to Instructions." - I disagree about the "bad games, period." part here. I figured out Utopia K240 without instructions (read: I didn't own the manual *cough*), and a lot of other games, and they were very good games, I still play them. Most new games have pretty decent ingame tutorials/manuals or they are self explainatory due to the low complexity. I really miss games of K240's complexity. Just imagine what could be done with that concept today!
"The Right to Feedback." - I agree here, but I hope developers doesn't take this point as "Put as many numbers and bars floating over the head of the players as possible".
"The Right To Motivation." - I disagree. Adventure, Exile (2D game mind you), Zelda 1, Metroid 1 and ome older RPGs were good (appealing to me) just because they didn't herd and nanny you around. They just went like: "Here's a world and some stuff, have fun!". I remember first playing Zelda 1, walking straight to the first level right away. Maybe I was just lucky, or maybe the map design was so clever that it tilted me in that direction. It felt awesome finding it all by myself anyways.
"The Right to Make Decisions." - I agree with this one, especially the mole-whacking analogy. A shooting course with flat figures that pop up might be another fitting analogy. That's how I feel playing most games today.
"The Right to a Swift Death." - Exile (old 2D game) didn't kill off the player if things were hopeless. The player was responsible for his actions and didn't get nannied by the game. If it's impossible to mess up without dying the game is probably too limited for my taste. I'm not much for 65536 damage invisible forcefields.
"The Right To Control Cut-Scenes." - I think most people agree with this one. I think another should be added, namely the right to skip ESRB notices and stupid DVD menus, but that's a different discussion. I just wanted to RAGE a bit about that. I'm done.
"The Right to Quit, Pause, Save and Resume the Game." - This is a tricky one isn't it? Being able to save anywhere makes you behave sloppy, the game feels pointless cuz you feel you just can reload anyways, and you never get the same feeling of excitement when you're SO near killing the boss.
On the other hand it's very annoying having to repeat things when you die. There's a few other solutions, like a limited amount of 'save-coins' you can use, or the Exile approach where you just teleport, or the Nethack-ish 'permadeath', to mention a few. In anyway I don't think being able to 'save-state' anywhere is an ideal solution.
The Chair Corp. comic(*00-12)
> There isn't an elegant gender-neutral pronoun,
True enough
> and using 'he' is just not correct.
How is it incorrect? It's been in use as a language standard for hundreds, if not thousands of years.
I also have no problem using "she" from time to time -- or always.
Both are quite elegant to use, and both are easily understood as to applying to no person in particular when used in context.
The neo-cultural imperative to strip genderosity from language is a fraud perpetrated those eager to assume paternalistic authority all the while disclaiming otherwise.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
I like it!
I want a new world. I think this one is broken.
Don't forget:
1. the right to make a backup of your disc.
2. install and play your game without having to reinstall bare Windows to do so (Starforce: hostile anti-user copy protection and Punkbuster, which currently hates GetRight of all things. Both quickly pronounce users as guilty of hacking without a trial)
3. install and play your game without needing ANY kind of internet connection whatsoever. Half Life 2 and the (currently vaporware) Prey will never touch my systems because of that.
Final Fantasy X
Not sure on this one, unless he means arcade-style games that don't have an end. Perhaps he's referring to games which have a bug that prevents finishing, none of which I've had the misfortune to encounter yet.
Mortal Kombat, Tekken, and other fighting games that make you figure out the combos by trial and error.
Bushido Blade
Sim City, Populous
Not sure, unless he means rhythm games like Parappa the Rapper or Space Channel Five
Sierra's Quest games (especially Space Quest) and any number of old adventure games.
Final Fantasy X
Final Fantasy games, Tomb Raider games, and lots of other console titles. Not to mention a horde of games based entirely on checkpoints. These are why at least one PS1 emulator comes with a "save state" function.
Checkpoint-only games like Killzone
Lots and lots of console games. Final Fantasy Tactics comes to mind. Non-console, X-Wing comes to mind.
Never encountered this, myself.
Here's my bitch list... err, gamers bill of rights I mean:
Physics: If you are going to try to make a realistic combat simulation game, make sure that those nicely detailed 50 ton tanks don't come to a dead stop when you run into a wooden crate! (Battlefield 2)
Keyboard Controls: If you are going to make a racing game that allows keyboard controls, make sure the controls are usable on more than the 100hp car you start out with. Nothing sucks quite as much as spinning out on every little turn. This one is for Juiced. NFSU2 got this right.
Splash Screens: If you want me to know that X, Y, and Z all made parts of the game, give me a way to skip past them! I don't want to sit through 30 seconds of mandatory splash screens each time the game loads. This is really sickening when the game has a problem and keeps crashing. I didn't spend a ton of money on a PC that can load stuff damn near instantly just to be delayed for marketing purposes. At least make the video files easy to find so I can delete them.
It's possible that the author simply hasn't sat in a writing class in a few years. About 8 to 10 years ago, the MLA standard for a personal pronoun that referred to an indefinite person was "she." The MLA created this situation to rectify what was seen as the discriminatory use of "he" for years, and most style handbooks advised alternating between "he" and "she" when writing a lengthy discourse involving indefinite subjects.
I can remember being taught in English classes that "she" was the correct way to approach a situation such as this Bill of Rights.
Of course, after only a few years, it dawned on the members of the MLA that "she" was equally discriminating. Thus, the correct approach is now "he or she" in situations such as this, though it is very common for writers to erroneously use "they."
Right to Win Not sure on this one, unless he means arcade-style games that don't have an end. Perhaps he's referring to games which have a bug that prevents finishing, none of which I've had the misfortune to encounter yet.
I actually have played such a game that was reasonably recent, called Sanity: Aiken's Artifact. Rather than use pre-rendered cinematics, all interactions were done in-engine. It was probably a 15 or 20 hour game that I got through and beat the final boss. At this point, there was to be a final interaction, which would presumably show everything going right and so on, except for the bug that in this final interaction that hero was a touch too close to a cliff and would die during the conversation, thus making it so nobody could see the ending. Arrrrghhh!
I have always loved how the old 2nd Edition D&D manuals handled this. From the introduction (Advanced Dungeons & Dragons: Player's Handbook (1995), p9):
A Note About Pronouns
The male pronoun (he, him, his) is used exclusively throughout the AD&D game rules. We hope this won't be construed by anyone to be an attempt to exclude females from the game or imply their exclusion. Centuries of use have neutered the male pronoun. In written material it is clear, concise, and familiar. Nothing else is.
This is a sig. Deal with it.
Alternation is awkward. He or she used repeatedly is sexist and exclusive. You can't use they or them because that be bad English.
So here's my solution: Combine "he" and "she." Of course, that pretty much just leaves "she," and it's not really inclusive, because it leaves out objects, like artificial intelligences and robots.
So She + He + It = Shit, our new, all inclusive pronoun.
Take for instance, this sentence that appeared in TFA:
"If the player doesn't get feedback, shit can't adjust shit's strategy, and the outcome will feel random. Players need to know whether their approach is working or not."
See, MUCH better!
vi ~/.emacs
Instructions: While technically any game came with a manual, I can think of several which came with piss-poor manuals, including one whose manual seemed to be made for a completely different game. It described stuff that didn't even exist in the game, or didn't work even vaguely like in the manual. I can only assume that they made the manual at a very early point, and changed their mind about half the design by the time they finished it.
Winning: I can think of a lot of games which, while technically weren't impossible to win, felt a need to throw some massive tantrum at you at some point, that was out of your control and nigh impossible to recover from.
E.g., try playing China in EU2. Everything is fun and games until the 1600's, when the game suddenly throws some scripted events at you that raise dissent sky-high and drop your stability in the basement. I mean so high that you literally can't recruit an army any more, and your tax income drops massively. Any conquests you did to that point _will_ be lost, as everyone revolts, _and_ the only way to stabilize the country into something even vaguely playable at that point is to basically move the army out of the capital and hope the rebels kill your government.
While technically it doesn't necessarily mean you've "lost", it sure feels that way.
Or take "Crusader Kings" where, since you're playing a dynasty as opposed to a country, if one of your emperors doesn't have sons your game may well be over. Literally. (Or some other unpleasantries, like finding yourself allowed to continue playing as the Baron of East Bumfuckistan, instead of the empire you've worked on building so far.)
In both cases we're talking stuff that's basically outside the player's control. E.g., in EU2 all that condensed nastiness in the 1600's is on timed scripts. It doesn't matter if you're the best emperor ever and your population loves you, it doesn't matter if your policies don't reflect the historical causes of those revolts, you _will_ have those and your work _will_ be undone as your empire crumbles before your eyes. It will happen no matter what you do, and even if you had any feedback in advance (but you don't) you couldn't prevent it.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
You seem to define "deffective" as in "the CD was physically unreadable", which is just about the only thing that would be solved by giving someone another copy. What if the software itself is broken and deffective? Because that's the actual product I bought there, and the CD was just the medium it comes on.
E.g., the german version of Victoria threw a script _syntax_ error right at the start of a new campaign. Yes, you've read that right. Not a crash to desktop, not some graphics glitch, _nothing_ even remotely blamable on my hardware or drivers. A script _syntax_ error. That game couldn't work as released on _any_ hardware.
E.g., a german version again, Everquest 2 was released with a completely broken translation, which actually did impact gameplay. NPCs and items would be named completely differently in the quest text and in the actual game, making it literally impossible to do what you were told. The NPC you were told to kill simply didn't even exist in the game. (And generally, you know it's bad when even the few fans tell you to try translating it word-for-word back into English, to figure out some texts.)
E.g., Phantasy Star Online Blue Burst doesn't seem to be able to connect at all on my XP machine, although it works flawlessly on my Windows 2000 machine. (So, no, it's not a case of ports being blocked by the router or ISP.) Mind you, I needed to dig through tech support faqs even just to get it to the point it would try to connect: first it didn't even let me input my name and password. No, literally, typing anything in those input boxes was a futile exercise. The only key they accepted was basically escape to cancel it.
E.g., to take an older game, take The Elder Scrolls 2: Daggerfall. The collision detection was so bad, that you'd fall into the void even when running on flat groud, or when teleporting back to town. I'm picking on it, instead of newer ones, because it's a clear-cut case of deffective software, and can't be blamed on drivers or hardware. It took many _months_ for Bethesda to try to fix it, and eventually they gave up and made a cheat code to teleport you back to the beginning of the map if you fell into the void.
E.g., Morrowind was shipped with a pretty nasty race condition that resulted in a crash to desktop when zoning. But as is usually the case with race conditions, on different PCs it produced wildly different results. On some you had a crash every couple of hours, but some people couldn't even leave the starting ship at all, because the game would crash when they went through the hatch. I'm not even going into the aspect that a game that crashes at all _is_ deffective, but the fact remains that some people just couldn't play it as shipped.
Etc.
So giving them a replacement CD is gonna solve... what? No, seriously.
Yeah, they were sooo trying to rip you off, by not accepting a game they couldn't run at all. Not. Geesh.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
Well, then, if "he" can be used to mean any gender, then why can't "she" be used in exactly the same way? It's just as clear, it's certainly familiar (it's one word you hear every day), and it's just as concise (one extra "s" now and then won't lengthen the whole article by any significant amount. And when you read it, it's still one syllable.)
Don't get me wrong, I'm not advocating either of them as such, but I _do_ find it peculiar that someone would need to throw a "what's with this 'she' crap?" tantrum. Using 'she' was insulting... how?
I don't know, I'm a guy myself, but I find it anywhere between hillarious and idiotic (or most often a mixture of both) the way some guys absolutely have to defend their supremacy in some field as if their manhood depended on it. As if, god forbid, even acknowledging that women gamers exist (e.g., by using a 'she' now and then) could make their dick shrivel and fall off.
Let me rephrase that: I don't even think it's a "guy thing" as such. It's not about "guys" as such, it's about complexed insecure guys who need to put someone down just to mask their own insecurities.
And you'd thing that what with being the victims of that, nerds would know better than to do that. In practice, frankly, it's the exact opposite. When you see someone blanketly insulting whole population segments, for the most idiotic and irrelevant pretexts (e.g., that they don't use vi, or that they play on a non-PK facet in a MMO, or whatever), chances are it'll be a nerd.
To anyone falling in that category: folks, get a life. Gaming is just a passtime, no more. It doesn't make you a "man" or anything, it just makes you less bored. Noone will come and beg to carry your baby because of your clan's scores in CS or your Linux PDA or whatever.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
The best solution is the nethack solution. You can quit & save whenever you want, but you can only load it once. i.e, it's not save per se but rather stand-by.
At least for parts where you usually don't have any save spots, it will solve the problem. For the save points, it can be allowed to save and load how many times you'd like, as expected from a save point.
^_^
One can also use the Spivak pronouns if one doesn't want to come off as sounding like a bit of a toff. :)
I think this article is silly but brings up a few interesting points. I do disagree with the "Right to Instructions" however. I think too many games these days have annoying hand-holding tutorials that the player is forced to endure for up to the first couple of hours of the game. Fable is a good recent example of this.
I really think that with some forethought, many games could be designed to allow the player to learn how to play the game without handholding. An obvious example is to simply make things easier on the player at first - avoiding allowing opportunities for any major player decisions or actions early in the game that can severely stunt or otherwise negatively affect the player's progression later on. I remember playing Arcanum and not being able to leave the first town because I hadn't concentrated on any one skillset enough to get past the goons guarding the exit - I'd have had to start the whole game over and lose a couple hours of gameplay.
I can live with optional tutorials, but it's my opinion that they're still indicative of a lack of good game design. I think the best approach is to include a manual and just make the game a little more forgiving in the beginning without doing any overt handholding. Draw the player into the world instead of destroying the immersion with silly tutorials.
Arguing about vi versus Emacs is like arguing whether it's better to make fire by rubbing sticks or banging rocks.
1.) Thou shalt not suck
2.) Thou shalt not covet another game/genre unless you do something new or different.
3.) Thou shalt not delay your release by more than 3 months.
4.) Thou shalt not glorify "smackin' a hoe," "clocking a grip," or "Bustin a nut."
5.) Thou shalt honor good game design over flashy graphics.
6.) Thou shalt not involve Mary Kate and Ashley, Britney Spears, or any other pre-teen/teen manufactured idol/heart throb.
7.) Thou shalt not overhype your creation only to produce a shiny turd.
8.) Thou shalt put effort into mini-games/extras or just leave them out.
9.) Thou shalt end your game with some sort of closeure other than just the names of the artistic director.
10.) Thou shalt not produce endless sequels in which you add a "quirky" sidekick.
http://teasphere.wordpress.com - A little spot of tea
I have the right not to be subjected to female third-person pronouns when the antecedent is of indeterminant gender.