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Published May 08, 2014 by Anton Temba, posted by wwwwww
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swiftcoder

This is turning into some sort of crusade, and I don't think the articles section is the place for personal crusades. Have you considered a dev journal instead?

You need to provide concrete examples to back up your arguments - rhetoric is not going to convince anyone. That might be by referencing techniques used in existing games, or by providing your own (detailed, technical) answers to known problems with infinite games.

For example:

  • Uniformity. Procedural generation is ideal for infinite worlds, but procedural algorithms only generate variations on a theme - they can't produce anything that they weren't explicitly designed to generate. How should we design algorithms to produce truly novel worlds?
  • Persistence. Procedural generation provides a way to prevent an infinite world from taking infinite storage space. But what happens when you chop down every other tree across an entire continent? Should we be content with building static worlds, or with throwing away changes as soon as the player looks away?
May 03, 2013 12:28 PM
jms bc

"deep prejudices and single-minded views...disgustingly immoral and is outright destructive to humans and the society. It degrades the mind"

Strong words for little games. That second quote sounds exactly like my parents 20 yrs ago, criticizing all video games.

May 03, 2013 02:59 PM
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May 03, 2013 03:18 PM
swiftcoder

There is nothing wrong with crusades per se. They just don't belong in the articles section.

If you want to write articles on specific problems, techniques or methodologies in the development of 'infinite' games, then I applaud you.

But from where I am standing, these three articles represent an increasingly emphatic soapbox for the promotion of a personal agenda. This article in particular is pretty much a paragraph-by-paragraph response to criticisms leveled at your previous two articles. I would suggest very strongly that you have such discussions in the comments section of the previous article instead, and then UPDATE THE ORIGINAL ARTICLE with the results of the discussion, rather than add yet another incomplete article to the site.

I'd like to add that I don't necessarily disagree with your "finite bad, infinite good" hypothesis, but you have yet to provide any credible evidence to back up this claim.

May 03, 2013 05:04 PM
smr

I tend to agree with Swiftcoder here. It seems like the articles section is being used as a forum for defending infinite games. I think you make some good points in your write up here, but I didn't come away from reading this with any knowledge I can apply. This sums up to essentially "I like infinite games. Here's why. Haters can talk to the hand."

May 03, 2013 08:05 PM
Ben Bowen

Hey, it's a nice post, but yeah... I find it a bit... meh. Crusadish. The biggest problem is your assertiveness and stretched vocabulary.

May 04, 2013 06:38 AM
Ben Bowen

First and foremost, I actually am. I have two projects already planned, one is a mech space combat game which is already fully designed, almost ready to be announced and is about to enter the production phase.


The second project is a space conquest game similar to 4X games in some aspects, although at a much more compact scale, but with complete direct control over your characters in realtime simulated interactive environments instead of looking at generic statistics, dice rolls and abstract representations you normally get in old traditional 4X games. Basically its like Cortex Command in space, bigger and better, but different.


However, I am just a single person and my proficiency is best at game design. Video games take a lot of time and effort to create, so before those two projects come out, might as well share my knowledge with an article than sit on it in secrecy for a couple years.


Every game developer is best at game design... until they finish a game. Then only a small few happen to remain "best" at it. I find your argument a very very ineffective and silly argument. I don't think you understand the process of game development like you think you do. Sorry. To be honest, go pickup Game Maker or something. You'll learn a lot about your capacity to design games. You're looking swell as of now, but don't be conceited.

May 04, 2013 06:56 AM
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May 04, 2013 02:00 PM
Ben Bowen

Debunking Prejudices Against Infinite Games


Hopefully that's a good hint on how you need to revise. "Debunking Prejudices" ... etc.

May 04, 2013 07:50 PM
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May 04, 2013 07:57 PM
Nercury

In short, a finite game is played with the purpose of winning (thus ending the game), while an infinite game is played with the purpose of continuing the play.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finite_and_Infinite_Games

Can we just agree that there are two types of games, which can be mixed together, and move on?

If not, I will write 3 more articles: "Debunking prejudices against games where you can win", "How to allow your players to make games in your game" and "How to make an infinite game by redirecting players to DirectX SDK download page".

May 04, 2013 11:00 PM
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May 06, 2013 07:19 PM
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