Memory

The combination of the internet and gaming has lead to a diverse number of applications that attempt to merge the two systems. There is as far as I know no single application which is commonly in use or is recognised as a merged internet/3D environment interface to the web. In this respect the merger of the two dimensional internet with the three dimensionality of virtual worlds is still an emerging field. The current terminology for this area of research calls it the ‘metaverse’, which is a term derived from the book Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson. Essentially the metaverse is a description of a system which is based on information transfer and communication through a global digital network, the main element of which is a digital representation of a 3 dimensional space – a digital universe separate from the real world but representing people and entities in the form of digital avatars which can interact in real time.

Some elements of the metaverse envisioned by Stephenson are:

• It is scalable to the extent that it can cope with millions of avatars in a single location,
• There are different levels of access, depending on interface devices,
• Level of detail is sufficient to identify individuals,
• Bandwidth is a factor in the level of sophistication of the Avatar,
• There are code based protocols that determine what can and cannot be done in the metaverse,
• The metaverse has an internal economy

Although there is no clear definition of what constitutes a metaverse, and in fact the overarching concept of a digital environment had been around for many years prior to Stephenson’s book Show Crash e.g. William Gibson is credited with the first use of the term Cyberspace in 1982, and subsequently popularised in his novel Neuromancer (Gibson, 1984).

Outside of the novel, the development of computer technology which was the inspiration for the fictional worlds continues to develop in slightly different directions. The terminology has however been adopted and has become part of contemporary culture. In general terms, the metaverse may now refer to the actual implementation of virtual worlds connected to the internet, and not the internet itself. It is not clear if these concepts will separate or merge into a single entity. Regardless of the terminology the development of a global 3D virtual space will happen in the near future and the technology and language will be derived from and driven by game technology development until an application arrives that tips the balance to bring game worlds into the mainstream of application development (cf. Virtual Worlds, ViOS (3D Internet Browser)).

Related to this is the term 'Web 2.0' which refers to the current trend in web technology to move to a more interactive web environment. As access to the web has increased and the technology has improved the web has become a much more dynamic means of communication. The perception is that the original web (Web 1.0) was essentially a read only interface were people could retrieve information, and web 2.0 is a much more interactive place where people can interact in real time. However, this is merely a perception, the web has always been capable of supporting interaction, it is simply that the technology now runs at a speed which makes interaction appear to be near real time, not only text communication but also audio and video. Hence, to over simplify, Web 2.0 is a term to describe the use of the web as a real time communication tool (cf. Web 2.0).

The new direction of my research is the development of a new type of web browser that supports not only the existing web but also merges with the existing virtual world technology. The concept would be to provide a browser that provides a usable interface to all of the existing web content currently accessed via web browsers such as Firefox and Internet Explorer but which provides a virtual world representation of the web and integrates all of the current communication technologies such as real-time, text, audio and video. Additionally, the browser would provide a dynamic repository of web content presented in such a way as to help organise and maintain the users data. The browser would provide not only asynchronous data collection, e.g. RSS feeds, but also intelligent agent technology to collect and organise user requested data (cf. Software Agents).

The intent of such a 3D world is not to 'make a copy' of the real world but to provide an environment that uses visual display in order to 'organise' and make sense of all of the data available on the internet based on each individual's browsing habits and experiences. In terms of communications technology the browser would enable person to person and muti-user interactions in a 3D environment at various levels of interaction, text, audio and video. Given the ever increasing bandwidth of the internet and computing power of PCs, each machine connected to the internet is capable of acting as an element is a distributed game network i.e. as a game server. There are already many examples of using the internet as a global super computer (List of Distributed Computing Projects).

The scope of such a project is much greater than can be achieved in a short time by me, however some of the design aspects and perhaps an attempt at a demo of the world mechanics could be archived in terms of a prototype design. I have chosen the name 'Memory' as the codename of the project to reflect the function of the application as a 'memory mansion'.

Time's End

The original idea of my Time's End project was to base a game around time, time-travel and the end of the universe. This could have taken many forms, but my original idea was for a puzzle/adventure style of game where the character would achieve the quest in an open ended environment where the player had full control of time travel within the context of the game.

As I considered the various options and refined how the game would work I found that I wanted to reduce the game to only the basic mechanic and remove all of the conventional 'game baggage'. By this I mean that there are certain conventions that are so 'intrinsic' to modern computer games that they are very hard to avoid. In this instance I found that as soon as I thought of a scenario involving a 'human' character setting out on a quest I wanted to put in encounters that would involve combat in some form. I found that if I developed the story of the character and the reasons for the character to exist and do the quest, it involved conflict and again a strong incentive for combat. So I had to ask myself why is this and is it what I want to do?

As to the why, I have looked at this and considered where it comes from. It is evident from the literature online and in books that the problem lies at the foundation of digital games. Most (an over generalisation I know) digital games are based on fantasy role playing games (the paper and pencil variety) first introduced in the 70s, which were themselves derived from war gaming which has been around for much longer. The basis of all of these games is that the players create a character and go on epic quests which involve both fighting in and exploring a fantasy world created by a games master. The combat system is the basis of (all?) these games! The stories and scenarios only really work because the character has to overcome something which is preventing them from completing their quest, whether it is puzzles or monsters (the terminology in gaming for anything that moves and opposes the player, mobs - mobile monsters). The inspiration for many games undoubtedly also comes from film - but can only be represented in game terms using the rules set up by FRPGs. Looking at the kinds of film which have inspired games, I see the same pattern, action/adventure games involving quests with opposing forces and puzzles to overcome. Similarly looking at the literature which inspires games I see the same pattern.

There are very good reasons why this is the dominant paradigm in digital games, the mechanisms of FRPGs translate very readily and easily into computer programming code. The problem is that the unwritten rules of FRPGs the 'role playing' bit where the games master interacts with the players, talks, discusses and makes the story come alive - cannot be translated in to computer code, at least not in any 'meaningful' way (again an over generalisation but I am arguing that it is essentially true because my understanding of 'meaningful' goes beyond what I see in current games). The reason for this is fairly obvious, computers cannot 'think' they cannot react to nor evaluate situations, they cannot 'improvise'. All this does is leave game programmers with attempting to 'script' specific interactions and constrain players to a very narrow story line with specific predetermined outcomes (essentially putting in very dumb, wooden, actors who generally have only one line of dialogue and a very brief appearance before they die). Certainly it is possible to do this so that games 'work' but it will be a long time before such scripting achieves the level needed to approach even an approximation of the sophistication of human interaction.

Given these limitations what then can be done with digital games? Not much is my answer. People are aware of the limitations of the medium and are doing the best they can to improve the way games work using current technology however without massive research and development into making computers 'understand' the world and human interaction this will remain very limited (I have seen characters with as many as 7 different responses when I 'speak' to them! For speak, read push a button, and always the same lines and always the same responses but more than one). Games companies cannot afford this level of research (yet?) and they do not need it yet, while current game technology still sells and makes money why would the bother to go further? Is it even necessary - is there anything wrong with the current limitations on digital games? I think the answer is no, digital games are fine in their current form. Not only that, the digital game industry is still growing and expanding into different areas so any limitations are seen as transitory - things will get better is the assumption. Since computers cannot play characters why not return to the root of FRP and get people to play the characters - Multi-Player Online Games - Social Online Networks. Online worlds and gaming provide an alternative route to achieving something like the kind of interactions needed to satisfy people's need for 'engaging content'. But that is a different issue...

What about other forms of game non-FRP games? What about traditional strategy based games are they dead or do they have a future in the digital world? What about simulation of 'real life' activities are these type of game meaningful?

I think that traditional strategy based games will form the basis of what is now called 'casual games', however the problem is that the majority of these have to be single player games (although they could be played as multi player games within an online community e.g. Travian).
The problem with such strategy games is that if the game requires an opponent or opponents then these are played by the computer. Computer programs are very, very good at strategy and have to be 'dumbed down' to allow ordinary humans to play against them. Hence strategy games with no opponent will probably tend to be more popular? It seems that these days people do not like loosing and can only be fooled by a game for so long before they realise they are being 'allowed' to win - it is good for the ego, until you find out the truth...

Simulation of real life activities such as driving, golf, skiing, skating etc. will probably continue to be popular so long as the simulation can convincingly portray the action and hide the amount of 'assistance' being given to the player in order to allow them to succeed (sounds familiar? allowing people to win fool them in to believing they are good, stroke their ego - it works).

So what does this all this mean for Time's End? What I found was that on the one hand I was being asked to implement a role-playing type of scenario, developing a character and creating a story for the character to follow. Which is all fine except that the story must include conflict and conflict means combat, but I wanted to avoid combat. Which ever way the story is written, which ever part of the story forms the game it ultimately involves conflict (because that is the basis of story telling). OK, so what happens if I remove the conflict and just keep the puzzle solving bit?

What I had in mind was a maze type game involving puzzle solving to complete the quest (I removed all of the puzzles that involved combat). What is left is a maze that the player has to traverse with 'environmental' puzzles required in order to complete the quest. So I had a look at maze generation and maze theory to see what has been done already. Essentially traditional mazes can be solved by a 5 year old in about 2 seconds so the maze becomes nothing more than a consumer of time. However, maze theory does indicate that there are mazes which cannot be solved by traditional means. So I devised a multi dimensional ever changing maze that requires a little bit more than just wandering around in order to solve i.e. a strategy a bit more complex than 'follow the left hand wall'. The point of the game being that the player has to find things in a maze in a given time limit, so the maze has to delay the player sufficiently to make the time restriction meaningful. Also the maze has to be different every time the player plays the game so that the maze cannot be mapped (again a traditional method of solving a maze - which for digital games means 'look up the answer on the internet' and when I say the answer I mean 'The Answer' because most games have only one effective solution). OK So I have my game, it avoids all the common things in current digital games and it has a level of complexity that would allow it to be re-playable. Job done? No. It is too easy, what about doing something else, something more difficult? What about doing research into something that is an issue with digital games and for which a new insight would be helpful.

As Pooh Bear would say 'Think, Think, Think ...'

Time the universe and everything!

I was thinking about time travel. There is a standard paradox that says if anyone goes back in time and does anything that means they would never be able to go back in time in the first place causes a contradiction and therefore time travel is not possible e.g. I go back in time and kill myself or further back and kill one of my parents then I cannot exist therefore I cannot have gone back in time. Similarly, if in the past I walked through a meadow and saw a flower, then afterwards I go back in time to just before I walked through the meadow and I pick the flower. I have both seen and cannot have seen the flower in the past! Therefore there is a contradiction and it cannot happen - time travel cannot ever work, any event that has happened cannot be undone, anyone going back in time cannot do anything, nor have any effect whatsoever on the past. The flower example is the same if there are two or many time travellers. Hence time travel is not possible.

Is there a different way to understand time such that time travel could work?

Theory of Physical and Spiritual Unity
Identity is not physical but spiritual and time travel moves the spirit backwards undoing memory. If so, then time travel is possible but of no value. Time travel would move the spirit back in time within the same physical body erasing memory as time goes backwards. There can be no contradictions because nothing changes in the physical world and the spiritual world remain intact because memory is erased. Going back beyond ones birth date results either in death/extinction or in reversion to the previous incarnation depending on which belief system the traveller has.

Theory of Infinity
Every event that has an effect on the physical world creates a parallel universe in which that event is a possibility. A time traveller exists in all of these parallel realities at the same time, and every thing any of these instances of the traveller does fragments reality. Multiple travellers cause a multiplication in the number of realities. In a few seconds the number of realities reaches infinity. Contradictory realities are not created. Infinite reality means a time traveller would end up in a random universe when they travel back in time, a universe totally different to the one they left, but still one in which everything appears consistent. Infinity means that time travellers can also travel forward in time since all possibilities exist, however the traveller would never be able to reach a specific point in any reality, every jump would be to some random reality totally different to the one they left. Time travel then is possible but can only be useful in terms of escaping from one 'reality' to another. Reality itself would then have no definite meaning.

Theory of Convergence
Time and Space are convergent on a single reality. Any event that changes the time-space continuum results in a balancing event that restores the equilibrium of time and space. This means that the time traveller creates a pocket of chaos at the point of leaving and re-entering time-space. The chaos event ripples out from the location of the traveller and reality twists and turns in order to restore the time-line and strange events surround the traveller until the space time events converge on a single reality. The danger caused by the chaos is only a danger to the traveller since the convergence will attempt to restore everything to its original state in time and space and the traveller is the cause of the disruption. Multiple travellers in the same area create greater chaos. Time travel becomes possible but would be very dangerous to the traveller if they travelled back to a time that could have any effect on the travellers future i.e. any point in the time-line of connected civilisations, back to the dawn of the species. This theory would allow very short jumps back in time that would be relatively safe, or very long jumps back in time that would be relatively safe. Anything in between would be very dangerous up until the point of convergence. It is not possible to predict the convergence 'effect', however see the following theory. This theory assumes a theory of continuum exists in time-space, a single reality is 'known' to the universe. The universe is consistent and anything that attempts to break that consistency is eliminated.

Theory of Inconsequentiality
Reality in time and space cannot be perceived. Only 'significant' events that occur in time have any effect on perceived reality. A time traveller can do anything that does not affect significant events in the continuity of time. If the traveller attempts to change anything that has a significant effect on the time stream they 'converge' i.e. as soon as they jump in time they exist simultaneously in two places at the same time, they have a partial existence in the past and the now. Anything they do that would change the time stream results in instant convergence on the 'future' time at the instant they jumped. This effect would be similar to particles that exist in two places at the same time but which converge the instant any attempt is made to detect their position, i.e. anything that would reveal the particles position results in it existing in a single position. Similarly the time traveller would converge the instant they attempted to do anything that changed the time line in a significant way. This theory assumes a theory of consequence exists in time-space, a destiny 'known' to the universe (e.g. significant events in time that has already passed are recorded in the essence of the universe). Anything that attempts to change that destiny is not allowed to happen. The universe decides what is significant not the traveller.

Aristotle's Poetics

Some thoughts on Poetics as applied to Games.

Completeness: A plot must have a beginning (a place where the story starts that is not dependent on prior knowledge), a middle where the story happens, and an end (the resolution of the story started at the beginning).
A Game must have a start position, a middle part that plays out and an end condition that is derived from the start position.

Magnitude: A story must not be so short that it is insignificant nor must it be so long that it cannot be comprehended.
A game must not be so short or trivial that is has no substance, equally it should not be so long or complex that it cannot be comprehended (remind me why I am doing this!)

Unity: A story should be complete between the beginning and end, but may itself be part of a larger story (an epic).
A game should only represent a single 'episode' and it should be complete from beginning to end. Different episodes should form parts of different games i.e. keep the context of the story simple and try not to over complicate it by adding multiple interleaved plots.

Determinate structure: The story must contain a definite sequence of events that are essential to the story, any one of which, if removed, would render the story inconsistent. This implies that if all the non essential elements of a story are removed and there is nothing left but a beginning and an end there is no story.
A game must have a determinate structure that involves a sequence of events that join the beginning to the end, this should not be an empty sequence (must have a middle bit) or there is no game. If there is no end there is no game - there is only an experience.

Universality: The events in a story should represent what is possible within the context of the story, so the sequence of events should follow a plausible sequence and not depend on an artificial or inexplicable turn of events.
A game must have a plausible sequence of events that lead from beginning to end of game. Chaos and pure randomness should be avoided.

I liked this bit the best "The spectacle has, indeed, an emotional attraction of its own, but, of all the parts, it is the least artistic, and connected least with the art of poetry." Yes indeed! Lots of spectacle is not a substitute for good content even if it is emotionally attractive.

Cowboys and Indians

I was thinking about the different types of games and what the rules of the games are and what they represent in an abstract way. Then I thought what type of game is a FPS? My conclusion was that it is a modern version of the old children's game 'Cowboys and Indians'. The game rules are similar; shoot the Indians in as 'cool' a way as possible. Make sure you have the biggest, best gun available and if possible dress up in a 'cool' costume while doing it. Make up a simple scenario that involves lots of Indians to shoot, but that is incidental to the main plot which is shoot Indians.

Hence, Game Theory 1: First Person Shooter = (virtual) Cowboys and Indians

Are FPS games targeted at young males by any chance?

What is a Game?

I thought I knew what a 'game' was until I tried to define what makes a game a game and not something else.

In the end the only definition I can come up with that seems to fit is:

A game is any activity that involves play

So, then what is play?

Play is anything that is done as a physical or intellectual stimulation of an individual and is not done for any other reason

The problem is that this seems to broad. I would have thought that a game could be defined as:

A game is a directed activity that has an outcome that is dependent on the actions of the player or players of the game

It has to be a 'directed activity', meaning it must take place within a defined structure that has known boundaries and must lead from a known start state to a definable end state. Within these limits the player(s) must be able to perform actions that have a direct result on the outcome of the game. The player must know the nature of the outcome they are attempting to achieve in order to make meaningful decisions about their actions within the game.

Applying this to recognised games:

• Chess - Yes this works
• Barbie Doll - No, it is not a game; No definable end state, no dependent actions
• The Sims - No, it is not a game; No definable end state, no dependent actions, there are actions which change the state but these do not have a direct result on any definable outcome.
• Space Invaders - Yes, it is a game; The defined outcome is a 'high score', the actions of the player have a direct effect on the final outcome (i.e. the score archived before you die). It is important that you die sooner or later, otherwise the high score is meaningless.
• Half Life (any FPS) - No?; The outcome is that you get to the end? but it is not a race so what is achieved by getting to the end? Does it matter in anyway that you get to the end? Not as far as I know, so it is not a game.
• World of Warcraft (any MMO) - No; There is no outcome, the actions of the player have no effect on the play field, It makes no difference whatsoever how you get from one state to the next.

So it goes on, there appears to be a problem with the definition of 'game' or there is a problem in the way that Digital Games are regarded? I can imagine that the lack of a definable outcome to many computer based games would lead people to 'give up' playing them after a while, once the 'experience' of the play becomes the only reason to continue and the 'game' has no other qualities. Hence I can see that such 'games' can only be played once. Is it part of the Design of computer games that they cannot be replayed? Is the experience of replaying the game so similar each time that it very quickly becomes lame and tired and people give it up?