thread: 2005-06-03 : The Subtle Rules
On 2005-06-03, Doug Ruff wrote:
Hi Vincent,
Sounds to me that this is about emergence. You know, put a few simple things together, and end up with something much more complex.
Thing is, I think it's hard to design with a particular emergent goal in mind: often, those simple rules will take you somewhere you weren't expecting. I wonder if the designers of Pit knew in advance this would happen, or whether they discovered it the same way as you did?
I also wonder how often a designer sees some unexpected behaviour in their game, and then stomps all over it with rules "fixes" rather than exploring the new possibilities and seeing if it results in a better game.
The concept of "alchemy" springs to mind - take some base ingredients, mix them according to a set of principles which are based as much on philosophy as they are on science, and try to create gold. Except the ultimate object of transformation is yourself.
Does this strike a chord?
