I’ve seen a lot of folks argue against changing certain elements of how virtual worlds are made today on the grounds that the medium has evolved into a genre, on the grounds that because there’s now a strong trend of making these worlds in a particular way, that we should go with the flow. There have been comments made here on the blog, for example, saying,

Some irreversible choices have already been made. The people who are growing this genre are making interesting choices within the parameters of the genre. You, I submit, are not because you are too busy wondering “what if we had gone with silicon-based life instead?” That moment has come and gone. New irreversible choices are being made right now, and if you want to have any input in them you need to accept the ones that have been made in the past.

If there’s one thing that people often have trouble grasping, it’s that evolution isn’t about progress, it’s about adaptation. It is about maximizing survival under given conditions.

Read More “Innovation, evolution, and adaptation”

Mike Ashley has a good post on why XBox Live can be considered a hub-and-instances massively multiplayer game.

Not a “world,” mind you. I agree with him in that sense.
Read More “World or not?”

For the academic-minded among you, the first issue of Games and Culture is out. Some usual suspects from the MMOG research and serious games fronts including Cory Ondrejka of Second Life, Dmitri Williams, Constance Steinkuehler, Celia Pearce, Ian Bogost, Greg Lastowka, Jim Gee, Nick Yee, and Henry Lowood.

And A Theory of Fun is actually cited. Yay, more academic cred.

Phil Steinmeyer has a great post up going over the process of creating a look for his word puzzle game Bonnie’s Bookstore. What this reveals is both how important the dressing of a game is, and also how paradoxically unimportant it is. It also suggests ways in which we can drive innovation in games in general.

Read More “(Un)dressing a game”