Re: Ultimate Goals in Olympia

From: srt@sun-dimas.aero.org (Scott Turner)

Date: Thu, 05 Jan 1995 22:37:19 +0000

>>I think that there are ways in which the Olympia universe can be made
>>more intrinsicly interesting (mainly by creating more depth and
>>content to the universe) but that's a topic for another discussion.
>
>Care to start it here, in public, so we can maybe get some outside
>commentary instead of hiding all our terrible--err--wonderful ideas
>on an internal design list again? :-)

I'm not going to run through any detailed suggestions here, but my
basic thought is that the game universe in which the players interact
needs to have more depth and mystery to it.

Depth can be added in a number of ways, but in playing Olympia I've
come to realize that one problem with it is that players aren't
restricted enough.  As a faction in Oly, I can do magic,
castle-building, exploration, trading, beastmastery, etc. all at the
same time.  One faction can explore every possible facet of the game,
and that makes things boring and eliminates interaction with other
factions.  I think that may need to be changed, so that it isn't
feasible (except in the long, long run) to have a faction that is
skilled at everything.

Mystery is more difficult.  In my opinion, a problem with Oly is that
information is too freely exchanged.  There's no real benefits to
keeping information secret.  In the design for Arena II, I built in
reasons for keeping certain information secret.  And while that didn't
work perfectly, it did create some of the sense of mystery that I was
after.  As a side-effect, it also increased player interaction,
because people were much more motivated to obtain information that was
hard to get and useful.

-- Scott T.

References

Ultimate Goals in Olympia
srt@sun-dimas.aero.org (Scott Turner)
Thu, 05 Jan 1995 00:40:52 +0000
Re: Ultimate Goals in Olympia
morrow@gandalf.rutgers.edu (John Morrow)
Thu, 05 Jan 1995 03:37:17 +0000

Referenced By

Ultimate Goals in Olympia
srt@sun-dimas.aero.org (Scott Turner)
Thu, 05 Jan 1995 00:40:52 +0000
Re: Ultimate Goals in Olympia
morrow@gandalf.rutgers.edu (John Morrow)
Thu, 05 Jan 1995 03:37:17 +0000