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bakes73
08-19-2009, 06:57 AM
Very interesting analysis of how games manipulate and play with player's perception of free will.


In linear games, there’s always the lurking danger that players will think they’ve got a shred of influence on how the game unfolds. In an effort to resolve this, many games employ a narrative voice to let players know what exactly what they’re supposed to do and give them at least a bit of motivation for doing. Despite how commonly it’s used, this device has a tendency to backfire when the commanding officer/mysterious stranger/computer geek is annoying or patronizing

More here.... (http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=24822)

I loved the twist at the end of Bioshock and to this day use the phrase "Would you kindly" to have others do my bidding. To no avail....
Exodus
08-19-2009, 08:37 AM
It's what game design is all about!
vherub
08-19-2009, 12:05 PM
another level of the beauty in portal is that there are means to solve the puzzles that hadn't occurred to the developers

in some regards though, true free will only happens when the player breaks the game, doing or trying something that the developer did not want to happen, or did not allow. Whether through bugs, 3rd party cheat devices or outright modding.
Exodus
08-19-2009, 12:28 PM
another level of the beauty in portal is that there are means to solve the puzzles that hadn't occurred to the developers

in some regards though, true free will only happens when the player breaks the game, doing or trying something that the developer did not want to happen, or did not allow. Whether through bugs, 3rd party cheat devices or outright modding.

Errr, you know what you want and what the developer wants can happen you don't have to be an anarchist to exercise your free will. O_O Wow that's a scary way to think...
JazGalaxy
08-19-2009, 01:19 PM
At least 1/2 of gamers I know, probably more, will actively try to do the opposite of what the game is trying to tell them to do immediatley upon starting the game.

I have no idea why, and it's annoying to watch them play, but the first thing they do is go "what's over this fence!? and then spend 10 minutes trying to jump over it". THERE'S NOTHING OVER THERE! I say incredibly annoyed and then they inevitably reply with "but I want to go over here. Why can't I go over here?"

You can also replace that scenario with "why can't I kill this guy" and that's another one of my primary frustrations in watching other gamers play games.