Original Comment by: Patrick Dugan
http://www.kingludic.blogspot.com
Thanks for reading Olumide. You said "the game opened my eyes to something new called 'choice gaming.' Choice is what gaming is all about! Haha, I hope that doesn't come across in a condescending way, but I get the feeling that the domination of ludic games has shrouded that simple truth from the gaming masses. Paidia makes play explicit, whearas a ludic game features play as an implication of solving the "problem" of the game. I explore this in an upcoming article for this magazine, and in an upcoming Gamasutra article I explore tailoring the game to the player's choices, rather than the other way around. If that doesn't make sense read this post by Craig Perko, he's smarter than me: http://projectperko.blogspot.com/2006/01/tricking-players-into-having-good-time.html
Bioware is one of those rare companies that manage to keep making good games despite the pressures of a corporate environment. I think their upcoming titles (and Jade) will suffer from contentitis, that is they're spending millions making content to suit a very limited verb set. Their characters are probably going to be fragmented constellations of dialogue trees and booleans, and they might try to pull some stochastic punches like the new Elder Scrolls does with its evolutionary computed terrain. But they aren't innovating in terms of algorithms, in terms of design, only in terms of content.
That said, I'm aiming to make a serial storyworld with Crawford's new engine that will be the same sort of high fantasy theme as Dragon Age. The difference is my characters are actually intersting and you'll be able to have verb-based conversations with them, where instead of each juncture in the convo being a pre-fabricated choice of text options, each juncture will offer a choice between verbs which are atomic, or molecular maybe, in that they'll vary based on context. Relationships will be malleable and an overall scoring system will gauge the player's preferences and manipulate cuasation behind the scenes to provide a very customized experience. The combat will be interesting and cerebral, forcing the player to outthink the opponent and their techniques, much in the way that the Naruto anime series does combat. I'll accomplish all of this with a scratchware budget and expressive 2D graphics. If anyone is interested on working on this for royalty share let me know, since its episodic scratchware you could see royalties shortly after the series debut.
prwatson: Yes! Thats a great take on it. I personally live a pretty paidic lifestyle. The axioms for that is believing (or casually assuming, you don't have to be religious to be paidic) that you will live forever and have ultimate freedom in the present.
