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Brave New World of Open-Source Game Design
Greg Chudecke writes "The New York Times recently ran an article on game companies that get design input from gamers. The article is branded as 'The Brave New World of Open-source Game Design.' The title may be a little misleading as it isn't exactly like the game design is open source for editing, however it is interesting that gamers are getting an opportunity to shape the games they play."
Indeed. The correct title is, Finding Syngergies with Valued Customers Through Web 2.0 Social Methodologies.
The scary part is that title actually makes sense. 0_o
www.nexuiz.com
www.openarena.ws
www.tremulous.net
So the 'input design input' is basically beta-testing. It is in NO way open-source, by any of the definitions people use. A game company asks people to play the game before it is released and then uses their input to adjust the game? Shocking!
Does that mean the gamers tell the studio how they would want the design input to be handled??
I don't know how this is considered "new". It's been going on for at least 6 or 7 years. I know because I've been involved from the community side of things since then with EA on their Need for Speed titles. In fact EA flys community webmasters out to thier studios quite regularly and puts them under NDA's to talk about what's coming up and what they think, especially on thier bigger franchises. As webmaster of Racerplanet I've had lots of interaction with the developers, mostly EA but other Publishers have stopped by the forums at least over the years.
What could possible go wrong ?
This has nothing to do with Open Source, why mis-use the term?
Full frontal nudity.
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
... and I recall that I once upon a time did a market(ing) research job for EA at the end of last century.
Though it was just focus groups, it shows that the idea is not particularly new.
CC.
TaijiQuan (Huang, 5 loosenings)
Before we all start hyperventilating and berating the NY Times for their faulty definition of "open source", let's remember who their audience is. Using "open-source" to refer to a development process where the customers get much more ability to view and modify the content "en route" is not technically a correct definition, but it's a succinct phrase that people understand; it gets the point across.
Think of it like the difference between "hacking" and "cracking". Yes, mass media uses hacking "incorrectly" 99.9% of the time, but they are using the definition that people can understand: to insist they do otherwise is linguistic snobbery.
So no, there is no willful ignorance (or Microsoft plot to water down the definition of open source) at work here, they're just making things plain for their readers.
Dislike the Electoral College? Lobby your state to join the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact.
So, ignoring the use of 'open-source' in a way that isn't remotely applicable, what this article is saying is that some developers have given up on having their own ideas and are now taking random ideas from users instead.
Christ, if that works... I'm starting my own company. I can rip off ideas from random internet junkies all day long.
"If you make people think they're thinking, they'll love you; But if you really make them think, they'll hate you." - DM
Eamon was framework for a text-based adventure game on the Apple II long before the New York Times was writing articles about open source software (and getting the definition wrong.)
that get input design input from gamers.
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I`ve posted about this game before, but CitiesXL is a great example of game producers getting input from the community during development. The game is basically going to be a city managing simulation ala Sim City. So far, it looks like a pretty incredible offering, with some neat elements involving online play. Release date so far is vague, but I`d guess Fall 09.
This has been going on for a long long time. It's called focus testing. If you play through Half Life 2 or any other Valve game that features commentary, you'll often hear how they changed things based on user suggestions/feedback (amongst other things).
Seriously, why was this modded Flamebait? Everything he said is true; for the most part Open Source games suck and are far behind their proprietary brethren in pretty much every aspect.
User suggestions are great and its good they are doing this. That said one thing I would prefer is if there were more good open source games available. Better yet I would love to know why something like an Open Source Online RPG game has a hard time finding developers but other projects with less global appeal seem to have larger developer bases. Its interesting. (Disclaimer: I'm a core developer for an online RPG called Peragro Tempus ( www.peragro.org ) and have always pondered why gaining developers is so difficult.
That sounded like a joke till I looked at it a bit more and realized, ugh, that's probably what they really call it -- their new paradigm (shudder).
But, is it proactive?
Truisms of Game Design:
1) Not only is the customer NOT always right, the customer is often dead wrong. (If you think they're always right, sales is just down the hall)
2) Fun is HARD. Much harder than you think.
3) Staring at anything 10+ hours a day for months on end will cause blind-spots in your overall understanding of it - this is why you do focus testing.
So, they are checking with the customer what they want in a product/game, calling that open-source input for some marketing reason AND saying that is something new. Am I missing something?
alias possession='chmod 666 satan && ls
It's still not that radically new a concept IMHO. Most games are involve one or more of the following:
1. are made by gamers in the first place. The reason why so many people want to work in the game industry, even at ridiculously low wages, is that they are gamers in the first place. So not only you have one or more gamers involved before even writing the first line of code, you'll have actual gamers actually writing those lines of code, scripting the NPCs, drawing the cut scenes and textures, designing the levels, and writing the dialogue.
Sometimes it's even people who love the thing that the game is themed around. E.g., the way I hear it, Statesman (of City Of Heroes fame) is actually a genuine die-hard comic fan. And he plays video games.(E.g., supposedly he got the much maligned ED idea while playing a platformer on his GBA.) And he made a video game about comic-book superheroes. I'd say he was very qualified to give input in the conceptual design phase there.
(Though true enough, you often can tell when a company just gets into a genre none of them played or liked, by their building an awful game based on awfully wrong assumptions.)
2. involve some focus groups, other forms of dialogue with gamers, etc.
Heck, Sony for example seems to be pushing really hard to please female gamers and pulls stunts like having a player play Queen Antonia Bayle of Qeynos for the various events. (Sorta like Lord British's character in UO, but this time it's not the character of a dev, but of an actual girl who plays EQ2.) Plus, gives a lot of attention to female gamer guilds and the like. I'd be genuinely surprised if they don't get at least some occasions to voice their concerns and such.
3. involve experience, including player input, from previous games.
E.g., Statesman's new project is Champions Online, another superhero-themed MMO. I should think he took with him a lot of the experience of what worked and what didn't work for the players in COH, and a lot of player input received along the way.
E.g., Raph Koster IIRC worked on a MUD before joining UO, and then took his experience with both over to SWG. (Ok, ok, so I guess sometimes experience doesn't precluse fucking up;)
4. indiscriminate player input can actually be bad, if not verified by other means.
E.g., Blizzard makes the servers generate a _lot_ of statistics, so they can know exactly which class killed which other class too often, what spec did more damage to a given boss, etc. So they can actually use hard data to check if some class's complaints or wishes for more power are justified, or just whining. That long period of fine-tuning and tweaking they gave all their games after release, was essentially very much based on player input... just not (only) the post-on-a-board type. They looked at what those players actually do in the game.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
"the long-standing barrier between the game maker and game player that was set up to protect the profitability of projects is crumbling."
This article is wrong in so many ways. The long standing barrier? There's no barrier between game designers an gamers, in most cases the game designers are gamers themselves, in addition there are in house testers (dedicated gamers) to play the game at different stages and give feedback. And then there are the open source games, and indy games made by gamers for gamers. New York Times is out of touch with reality when it comes to computer games.
I have the perfect compromise! Just draw boobs and vampire fangs on Tux. If that isn't enough, draw him having sex with a hot ass female penguin while he sucks the blood out of a mermaid and stabs Bill Gates with the Sword of Gnu. Mwahhahaha!!!
Snakes in a plane + second life + penis monsters + rpg maker: the game! With graphics stolen from Limbo of the Lost.
Since I haven't seen it mentioned yet, and it seems to fit the topic: :P
(though I haven't RTFA, where do you think we are...?) Overgrowth
I've been following the blog for a while, because of the developer videos they used to do, and they seem to be a very open development team. The articles they do almost daily are detailed and informative, especially to those like me that have an interest in game development, and I'm gonna stop now because I've realised I'm gushing
Since Darkfall is an utter and complete disappointment from the beta videos I've seen and from friends that are IN beta... Mortal Online is the next best thing.
The developers are posting the methodology of their ideas and having people comment on it. It's nice to see them having a back and forth about ideas in the game that players are helping to shape. The 10,000 foot overview is still the developer's but the nitty gritty details players are helping to iron out, or so it seems. Release will tell us more on that, but at least I *feel* part of the process.
The price is always right if someone else is paying.
Every time a game developer gets it right, I smile, because it's such a rare occurrence.
City of Heroes/Villains is offering a mission editor with their next major content patch, which is a nice step in the right direction. It's just about the only thing that could pull subscribers away from wow.
It's not about having the most powerful tools to do what you want, it's about being able to do what you want with minimal fuss.
If you can read this, I forgot to post anonymously.
because the article has nothing to do with open source games. You both read the slashdot title and immediately went to the comments to talk shit.
I am usually a supporter of the Times, but this time they are really being irresponsible. It's difficult enough to educate the public as to the true meaning of "open source" and "Free software", let alone when we're hampered by these dumbed-down, technically ignorant reports. This article only spreads confusion, and certainly doesn't highlight the great work being done by the many great, true open source game developers in the community.
...the idea is not particularly new.
No kidding, it's almost as old as the internet. Older still if you count pre-tech endeavors. The only difference is that today it is completely visible; which incidentally is why attempts are currently underway to "normalize" this behavior.
Sorry. If the readers of NYTimes are too dumb to grasp Open Source (I definitely doubt that), then it would be the responsibility of the paper to educate their users, not to dumb then further down.
I think it's rather bad research by the article writers. The same as when they talk about KWh per hour :-(
/. ... if you think it's such a bad title why title you own story it as well?
"however it is interesting that gamers are getting an opportunity to shape the games they play"
Never heard of D&D?
This is not "collaborative design" or "community design" or any of that nice sounding fluff. What it is is a company getting free labour, then selling the product and not giving any money back to those who contributed. This is basically doing what a consultant would do, but without the $$/hr. I could get behind this if the games were free after they were done, but.... no, this is just free labour.