Studio Cypher

Ludium 2 Thoughts

Will Emigh — Wed, 04 Jul 2007 20:26:00 -0700

Why a game?

If we want to argue that games can have serious outcomes, at least some of our conferences should also be games. The first Ludium was a hybrid of sorts, with several mini-games only loosely connected to the main thrust of the conference. This Ludium was designed from the ground up as a play experience that would also have a serious outcome: a vision of how video games and policy should mesh.

Some have argued that the game framework of the Ludium warped the results (in particular, critics find the statements of policy to be relatively weak). I think you’d find the same broadness in any statements acceptable to a reasonably large heterogeneous group. In addition, any function with a similar goal is going to be game-like in some respects. Robert’s Rules of Order are merely a more familiar set of rules.

In particular, we designed the game to encourage the behavior we found most useful at the last Ludium and other conferences. Primarily, we wanted to make sure that everyone felt that their ideas had been heard. We wanted the Ludium to end with a group of people who were invested in the results.

What worked well?

Based on people’s comments after the Ludium, I think we met that basic goal very well. Even though not everyone agreed with all of the statements, they seemed to agree that they deserved to be discussed. And, unlike the first Ludium, there was a much greater sense of cohesion at the end, despite the sometimes vigorous debates during the conference.

Probably the central reason that everything went as well as it did is something that we can’t take the credit for: the attendees. We had a great group of people from diverse backgrounds who played the game with an eye towards the future. It would have been great to have more people and more stakeholders represented, but the people who did come were dedicated and cooperated even more than we expected.

A design choice that really made a difference was starting with small groups and merging them over the course of the Ludium. As a member of a group of 2-4 people, each player was able to have at least some say in the platforms that were considered. It was heartening to us that many of the statements coming from these distinct groups were very closely related. That indicates to me that there is a broad consensus about the most important areas of video game policy.

What could be improved?

In retrospect, the spies of Koithuo were the most game-like element of the Ludium. These three individuals were given a pre-defined list of ten concepts before the Ludium began, with the goal of getting as many of these as possible into the final platform. When designing the game, we had no way of knowing which aspects of the industry would be represented. To make sure that there would be some input from the industry as a whole, we used a Delphi study to find the ten most important policy ideas among a wide range of stakeholders. That ensured that these points would at least be discussed during the Ludium.

This turned out to be an unnecessary precaution, since all of the statements given to the spies were independently introduced on the first day. Given the makeup of the conference, we probably could have done away with the spies entirely. With a more antagonistic set of players, a less universal goal, or a more controversial topic, the spies could still provide a valuable service.

Procedurally, the biggest problem was that it took too long to tally votes. The scoring system required detailed record-keeping of who sponsored which statements. There were many more mergers of statements than expected, which made calculating the results slower than in playtesting. Physically entering the ballots into the computer also took too long. In the future, the IP system could be replaced with a simpler scoring system and ballot-entering could be done in parallel on multiple computers.

Was it a success?

It’s still early to say whether or not the policy will lead to real-world changes in video game policy. Nevertheless, there’s no doubt in my mind that the game itself was successful. The people who attended the Ludium left with a feeling of consensus and produced a document that has already fostered myriad discussions. The statements produced by the people of the Ludium won’t end the debate about video games and policy, but they show promise as a beginning.

Ludium 2 Results

Will Emigh — Wed, 27 Jun 2007 21:30:00 -0700

The second Ludium is over and done with, although hopefully the final platform will live on. The wiki has more details. There are also interesting notes/discussions on Terra Nova and the Virtual Cultures blog. Several other attendees (including ARGNet’s own Michelle Senderhauf) have written about their experience as well.

Look for thoughts about the game itself in the near future.

Ludium 2

Will Emigh — Fri, 22 Jun 2007 03:20:00 -0700

The second Ludium begins today, so that’s where you’ll find us bright and early this morning setting up.

It should be a lot of fun and hopefully we’ll get a good list of statements about video games and policy (watch this space for details).

For those of you who can’t be here today, you can follow along with the Ludium Flickr group and Twitter page!

To those leaving Perplex City

Ian Pottmeyer — Fri, 08 Jun 2007 18:30:00 -0700

We were all pretty surprised when we heard the news of your departure. We’re sorry to see you go, as we were looking forward to the stories you were going to tell during Season 2, but we’re also looking forward to whatever it is you’ll be bringing to the ARG community in the future.

Best of luck to you, in all your endeavors.

Serious Games part 2

Nathan Mishler — Mon, 14 May 2007 06:47:00 -0700

Serious Games

You could sum up my position as “games have potential not yet realized” and “part of that potential is allowing players to explore positive ways to work around problems.” This fits in to the concept of Serious Games, but I think that concept needs to be made more broad. Not all messages from author to player need to be about a Serious World Issue or an Important Educational Opportunity. Not everyone does, or needs to, think on those levels. I believe that games can teach players about sharing or compassion, and those would be just as much a Game For Change as a game about saving the rainforest.

ARGs as serious games

ARGs are better suited as serious games than most traditional console or PC games. While it is easy to make a game about “hit, punch, shoot” on a PC, it is actually very hard to allow a player to perform any of those actions in an ARG. With the exception of live events, most ARG players will never come in direct physical contact with characters in any way, shape or form. You cannot punch a character through the internet.

Players of ARGs are encouraged to explore and experiment. To send encouraging or hateful emails to characters, and see what the results are. Players’ actions within ARGs are, by necessity, at a distance and not of a violent sort. ARGs are therefore excellent teaching aids and can allow players to experiment in healthy, possibly life-changing ways.

I think that once ARG creators, and video game creators in general, recognize their position as artists instead of craftsmen they will begin to create games that challenge players. This challenge will not just be in a “this game is hard” sense, but it will challenge how a player thinks and interacts with their world.

Covert vs Overt

At least, the goal will be to challenge modes of thinking. I am reminded now about a quote from the author Kurt Vonnegut:

“When it became obvious what a dumb and cruel and spiritually and financially and militarily ruinous mistake our war in Vietnam was, every artist worth a damn in this country, every serious writer, painter, stand-up comedian, musician, actor and actress, you name it, came out against the thing. We formed what might be described as a laser beam of protest, with everybody aimed in the same direction, focused and intense. This weapon proved to have the power of a banana-cream pie three feet in diameter when dropped from a stepladder five-feet high. “

I’m not calling for video game creators to be a laser beam focused in any direction. One of the big pitfalls of the move towards “Serious Games” is what I think of as “Too Serious Games.” Those games are the ones that come out of the starting gate (sometimes even on the packaging!), trumpets blaring and drums booming, pronouncing to the player that they are going to be Taught a Lesson.

Nothing turns off an audience faster than a proclamation like that.

Game creators must have a softer touch. You have to get off your soap box and allow players to play, to learn and experiment in the world you have created. You also have to allow them to disagree with you, at least a little. Remember: games are a conversation, even if the player never gets to talk directly to the game creator. If I’m a player, and I’m just being preached at, I’m going to tune you out. But if you allow me to experiment, to learn and see your point of view, I might be convinced to agree with you in the end.

In fact, I want to praise World Without Oil as a Serious Game done right. I see very little preaching going on, from game creator to player. In fact, it seems that the creators, for the most part, have stepped into the player’s shoes and are now part of a greater dialogue that is mostly created by the players. The players are allowed to think about the situation, the world without oil, and are allowed to come to their own conclusions. I think that a lot of people will change how they look at the world through this, and the change will come from within, not just from the game telling them they should. That’s my prediction, anyway.

My thoughts in a paragraph: Serious Games are a good thing and there should be more of them. Serious games should be big, but they should also be small. Serious games need to be a conversation, not a lecture… and they should be fun. As game designer Raph Koster says, “Fun is when my brain tells me I am learning.”

Serious Games part 1

Nathan Mishler — Thu, 10 May 2007 11:45:00 -0700

This month’s ARG Roundtable discussion topic (started by Brooke Thompson over at Giant Mice) is “Serious Games.”

Some would say that games can’t teach players, that games are nothing more than entertainment. I do not agree with this statement. All games have the potential to change players, and more games should.

Potential

The general public has done its best to equate video games with smut of both the violence and sex varieties. Video game “defenders” have not done enough to redeem them, which is something I will touch on below. However, it seems sad to me that videogames even need defenders. We do not need people to defend the novel as an art form, or movies, or paintings. There isn’t even a need to defend “normal” games that have no art in them, such as football or chess. And yet we have a public and oft-times vicious debate about the merits of video games. Why is this?

Unfortunately, video games’ greatest strength is also their biggest potential weakness. Video games give a player agency in a constructed world. This agency allows a player to experiment, to act, to discover and explore. It allows a player to discover ways to help others, or to learn about environments that the player would normally never have a chance to visit. There is power in this. There is a difference between reading about a place in a book, and visiting the place virtually and being able to affect that “world” with your actions. On the same token, depending on the game and the developer, visiting this new place may also involve the player being able to affect this world in some very un-savory and violent ways.

The majority of game developers these days would rather make a game where the actions a player can take-the verbs of a game- only allow them to fight things in the world. ‘Hit,’ ‘punch,’ and ‘shoot’ are all verbs that are very familiar to video game players, partially because it is much easier to program those verbs than it is to create the more nuanced ways that people help and care for each other. Additionally, game creators still reside in a state where they view themselves more as craftsmen than artists, and the concept of authorial voice doesn’t occur to most.

“It’s just entertainment,” those people say. “It doesn’t mean anything.” The problem is that it does mean something.

Just entertainment

It drives me up a wall whenever I hear someone defend video games by saying, “It’s just a game. It doesn’t mean anything,” That defense implicitly agrees with the people who condemn video games for being smut by saying that they can’t possibly have meaning. It’s just a game! It has no message! In fact, it comes close to saying that it is not POSSIBLE for a video game to contain a message.

Nothing could be further from the truth. All video games have a creator. They do not grow on trees or spring fully formed from the earth. Just like books or movies, video games are a conversation between the creator and the audience. If a video game creator allows you to do something in a video game, they are giving the player permission to do it.

It’s fun to fight demons and it is fun to crash cars and pretend to work for the mafia. It is merely distressing that more game creators do not try to give players verbs that are alternatives to hit, punch, or shoot. I will talk about some games and their alternative approaches with my next article.

Ludium II

Ian Pottmeyer — Mon, 23 Apr 2007 21:17:00 -0700

The Synthetic Worlds Initiative and Studio Cypher are happy to announce the opening of registration for Ludium II. The Ludiums (Ludia?) are conferences about gaming that are, themselves, games. The topic of this Ludium is “Principles of Sensible Video Game Policy.”

Registration before May 16 is $95. After that, it’s $125, so be sure to register now!

Studio Cypher featured on ARG Netcast

Ian Pottmeyer — Sat, 31 Mar 2007 13:46:00 -0700

The great people over at the ARG Netcast had a very nice interview with Will and Nathan this week. They talk about designing ARGs, the work we’ve done in the past, and what we see for the future.

Have a listen!

Ludium II

Ian Pottmeyer — Sun, 25 Mar 2007 14:07:00 -0700

Studio Cypher is working with Ted Castronova on the second Ludium conference at Indiana University. The first one, which we also worked on, was a big success, and we look forward to the next one. From the article at Gamasutra:

Indiana University’s Synthetic Worlds Initiative has announced Ludium II, its second conference bringing together experts from academia, industry, and government to create a consensus platform that answers, “What policies should real world governments have with regards to synthetic worlds?”

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Designed by Studio Cypher LLC, the game has attendees play as delegates of a political party convention who must agree upon a common platform, and, SWI hopes, “will lead the group to a set of policy recommendations believed by most participants to be important, sensible, and feasible.”

High Stakes!

Ian Pottmeyer — Fri, 02 Feb 2007 17:28:00 -0800

Studio Cypher’s next game, High Stakes, has officially entered its pregame. Head on over to Vox Diaboli to get a glimpse of what the game will be about, or cut to the chase and sign up now!

Congratulations go out to Red Hatty for winning our survey drawing. Enjoy!