🚀 go-pugleaf

WILLIAMSON, JOHN EDWARD writes:
>
>First, why is there never any variation in the Nintendo-type of scrolling
>games (Mario, Street Fighter, Commander Keen, and the like)?  By variation
>I am not refering to the genre itself (though that too could use some new
>ideas), but rather the lack of variation in the number and location of 
>villians you are supposed to attack.  Or is memorizing the exact and predictible
>location of each villian part of the fun of the game?

Nintendo entered a completely decimated video game market in 1984
and could pretty much do what it wanted.  They chose to target the
younger set with games that little kids could "beat" through rote
memorization and repetition, etc., to cut down on frustration and
to make kids feel pretty good about playing.  This is all IMO, by
the way.  Unforunately, this sort of thing was blindly cloned and
now we're pretty much stuck with it.  I know several people who
refuse to play games that can't be memorized.

A second reason is that it is easier to design a game when all
possible actions are known.  The Joust designers, for example, 
created a "live" universe which operates according to various
rules.  They didn't realize that there was a "hole" which allowed
you to easily kill the supposedly difficult pterodactyl.  (For
the record, I think memorization games are b-o-o-o-ring.)

>And finally, what are you doing as designers in an attempt to lure women
>to play your games (and spend their money).  Aside from the Barbie Design
>Studio and the Laura Bow series I haven't seen any big ticket attempts to
>attract women into computer gaming (forgot about Ms. Pacman).

It is generally accepted that attempts to specifically target
audiences which don't normally play games fail miserably (see the
Journal of Computer Game Design for lots of rambling on this).
From what I've seen, non-game players are not attracted to the
incrementally improved versions of genre games which fans of
the genres seemingly never tire of.  Take a non-game player into
an arcade and they'll comment "all of these games are the same."
It takes a Tetris or Pac-Man or Donkey Kong to pull in new
players.

--
James Hague   
exuhag@exu.ericsson.se