Give them tools and a guideline, then allow the players to decide what the rules are and how to play. Would be a neat experiment, but I suspect some will tell me that we already have games like this. And I suppose that I don’t play them because without a firm set of rules it is too difficult to tell who is “winning”, and winning is a pretty big deal to a lot of gamers

We have a lot of games like this, and we play them all the time: Charades, Twenty Questions, the Blank Card Game. They’re not going to be produced by Milton Bradley, though, because there’s nothing much to sell. There are also plenty of “generic game piece” sets being sold as “X games in one!”, with a handful of general rulesets.

The difference between playing a made-up game and playing Monopoly with house rules is just that one of the two is, arguably, Monopoly. Some people like Monopoly better than Charades, and vice versa. Some very much enjoy both. For my part, I like to participate in someone else’s game as fully as possible, with no rules alterations; if I’m going to make stuff up, I feel I may as well make my own game.

Is there anything advertisers can’t buy these days?

ROI?

There is no “backwards”. There is only a different direction.

Like a Marine “retreat”.

I use my Credit Card all the time. I recently signed up for some new Super Duper, All Rewards All The Time card. When a friend asked me what the interest rate on it was, I said, “I dunno; I pay it off every month.” I hadn’t even thought to look.

[...] Comments [...]

You’re never stuck with what you’re given. House rules, or folk rules, or user-created content, must simply fit within the given framework.

Should the framework be designed with the intent of being more open than closed? I tend to think so. When we’re dealing with programming it is a bit different than having objects and a board. We tend to enforce rules with code, and if not enforced by code players will tend to say that it is “fair game” even if it is clearly a game-breaking exploit. But still, should we make the effort to make it as much like a board and objects as possible?

Give them tools and a guideline, then allow the players to decide what the rules are and how to play. Would be a neat experiment, but I suspect some will tell me that we already have games like this. And I suppose that I don’t play them because without a firm set of rules it is too difficult to tell who is “winning”, and winning is a pretty big deal to a lot of gamers

Oh my I’ve gone and confused my opinions on MMO design again

You’re never stuck with what you’re given. House rules, or folk rules, or user-created content, must simply fit within the given framework.

Sounds like the gaming version of Hobson’s Choice….player’s can do whatever they want as long as it fits within the framework created by the developers.

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