Re: PBM design and formulae - a fresh start

From: gym@dcs.ed.ac.uk (Graham Matthews)

Date: Sat, 03 Jul 1993 17:37:04 +0000

gym@dcs.ed.ac.uk (Graham Matthews) writes:
> >Might I suggest at this point that you have not played a really well
> >designed game. Ever played the game FlatTop. This game is a very realistic
> >simulation of carrier battles in the Pacific. Now the game is quite
> >obviously simpler than the reality, however I was able to use my knowledge
> >of aircraft, weather, ships, carrier battles etc to plan my strategy
> >quite effectively - I played the game assuming that it was the reality and
> >it worked well. In other words just because the game wasn't real and
> >the information was coming in a different format than the real world, etc,
> >doesn't mean that you cannot keep up the pretense. So I think your point
> >is only true of badly designed games - unfortunately there are a lot of
> >them about. But don't confuse what a game is capable of being like, and
> >what current games are like.
markiel@callisto.pas.rochester.edu (Andrew Markiel) writes:
> This is a nice example (I take back the comment I made earlier about
> not wanting to play such a game). However, I guess I don't see where
> the formulas are that should or shouldn't be revealed. It seems that
> such a game would be run simply by giving movement and combat rules,
> essentially like any board game. Certainly it's possible to make a
> good game without using complicated formulas at all, but I don't see
> how this addresses whether a game that uses a formula to calculate
> something should reveal that formula or not.

I was more contrasting FlatTops approach to alternatives where you do have
formulas for things and yet FlatTop shows that they are unncessary. For
example you have formulas for fuel consumption - FlatTop handles that
terrifically simply. etc

gym@dcs.ed.ac.uk (Graham Matthews) writes:
>[on games and wing simulations]
markiel@callisto.pas.rochester.edu (Andrew Markiel) writes:
> I have to point out here that games and wing simulations are quite
> different cases. Simulating the air flow involves using straight-
> forward numerical procedures to integrate well known equations: in
> other words, the super-computer is needed not because of the
> difficulty in formulating the problem, but because a large number
> of calculations are needed, over a large set of data.
>
> In a game, however, a significant difficulty is in choosing the
> equations; which parameters you consider important, and how those
> are related to produce a relevant number. Essentially, since in
> real life you don't know the formulas, the choice of formulas for
> the game is somewhat arbitrary, and thus it may be appropriate to
> tell the players what arbitrary decisions you have made.
>
> Now, you can work with the equations, tuning them until they do
> approximate the real situation, but this requires a lot of work,
> and still doesn't help if the game is supposed to represent
> something that does not exist in the real world (when can you say
> that your system is an appropriate simulation of magical combat?)

Three points :-

a) you do chose equations in many simulations depending on what you
are looking for. For example some equations give more accurate results
in higher dimensions than others ... In a game the art is in chosing
the formulas I agree but that in part seperates the good games from
the bad games (for games where the underlying reality is simulated
via formulae).

b) the same technology that is applied to a simulation can be used for
a game. Sure a wing simulation is all about integration, but what is
population growth in a game for example, if its not integration.

c) even when the world you are simulating is a fantasy world it still
has some "reality" criterion such as consistency, predictability, etc.
So you can still work with equations. The key is to make sure that
all the different equations hang together.

markiel@callisto.pas.rochester.edu (Andrew Markiel) writes:
> I'll agree, though, that if you can do this then the game is likely
> to be very good. However, I don't know of any PBEM games out there
> that would satisfy this (if you know of one, let me know :-)

Err the subject header gives target newsgroups as rec.games.design, and
rec.games.pbm so I wasn't just talking about pbm games. Mixup I tihnk...

gym@dcs.ed.ac.uk (Graham Matthews) writes:
> >Ever heard of graphics? Output for the tennis game is in terms of pictures
> >of the court, ball, players, racquet. Using this information a player can
> >develop an intuition for the game. You don't need VR - that is an extreme
> >position! Surely you have played a computer tennis or driving game. You
> >develop intution quite rapidly without any VR surrounds.
markiel@callisto.pas.rochester.edu (Andrew Markiel) writes:
> Again, really nice, but doesn't resemble any pbem game I've ever seen.
> I think you're arguing for "the way games should be", and I'd agree
> that you have some good ideas, but it's sort of off the topic of
> "should pbm games hide their formulas".

Sure it is off the topic I agree - thats the way threads tend to go on the
net. And yes I am arguing for the way games should be. I am disatisfied
with (most of) the current games (bar my beloved FlatTop of course!) and
would like to change them.

graham

References

Re: PBM design and formulae - a fresh start
rwallace@cs.tcd.ie (Russell Wallace)
Fri, 02 Jul 1993 14:54:28 +0000
Re: PBM design and formulae - a fresh start
gym@dcs.ed.ac.uk (Graham Matthews)
Fri, 02 Jul 1993 17:52:40 +0000
Re: PBM design and formulae - a fresh start
markiel@callisto.pas.rochester.edu (Andrew Markiel)
Sat, 03 Jul 1993 14:46:45 +0000
PBM design and formulae - a summary
rob@ccc.govt.nz (Rob McNeur)
Mon, 28 Jun 1993 09:53:02 +0000