Monthly Archives: February 2010

Musings

By Rubes | Published: February 17, 2010

Question: Can high drama be produced from a wide-open simulation?

Creating a game that tells a story is one thing. Creating a game that tells a dramatic, moving story is quite another.

Can you really get a dramatic, moving experience from a game that is not tightly scripted or linear? Can high drama truly emerge from an open, unbounded simulation-style game?

Everyday life is a wide-open sandbox. Clearly, there is high drama in real life. But, as mentioned a while back on rec.arts.int-fiction, “Most people’s lives are not filled with high drama all the time. Some events will be dramatic, but creating a dramatic story from those requires editing out all the mundane parts.” (greg)

That editing, in game terms, is what I imagine [More...] Read the rest

Posted in game design, interactive fiction, story in games | 3 Responses

Reviving the Past

By Rubes | Published: February 8, 2010

For those of you who don’t know, I did write one other computer game in the past, The Missions of Starship Reliant (aka, Missions of the Reliant). I had always wanted to write and release a game throughout my childhood, but all I knew back in the 80s was BASIC, and that never got me very far. And so, at one point in my mid-twenties, and being a Mac fan and all, I decided to pick up some books and learn Pascal. In 1994, amid great imaginary fanfare and to much fictitious critical acclaim, the first version of Missions was released in all of its $20 shareware glory. (The sequel, Missions II, was released in 1996, but it was really just an expansion [More...] Read the rest

Posted in Missions | 9 Responses

The Brew Turns Two

By Rubes | Published: February 3, 2010

Programming alert: The Monk’s Brew officially turns two tomorrow.

As far as blogs go, that’s hardly enough to impress anyone. My two initial reactions are (1) I’m startled that I’ve stuck to it even this long, and (2) sweet, another way to mark the passing of the years while Vespers still isn’t finished. So, for those of you keeping score at home: four years of development, two years of blogging, zero finished indie games. Closer, but not there yet.

This is not a high volume, high visibility blog by any stretch of the imagination, so I appreciate all (ten) of you who stop by here every once in a while to check up on things and see if the furniture has been moved around at [More...] Read the rest

Posted in miscellaneous | 2 Responses