Game design has "moved on"

[Sunseeker]

but it isn't a steady trajectory in art the way it has been in science. Yes new techniques and methods develop and even new technologies emerge that make the medium more flexible. But one wbdn't drive an 80 year old car for anything other than novelty, one coul definitely listen to an 80 year old song for the pure pleasure of it.

One wouldn't drive an 80 year old car simply because it is unlikely to continue to work, maintaining an old vehicle is difficult. But driving for "novelty" is driving pleasure. People still drive their Model-T's, their Mustangs, their Thunderbirds for PLEASURE, they are simply more difficult to maintain than a song that has been digitized. Enjoying the sound of a 1970's V8 roar to life is definitely pleasure.

But your comparison is flawed. Your appreciation for mechanically poor or technically unskilled music has no bearing on it's quality, only your perception of it's quality. You can like bad music, bad cars, all you want. That doesn't mean that we haven't gotten better at making music, just as we have with card, even music in the same genre.

If you think science ONLY improves, I'd like to remind you of the dark ages.

 

[Farscape]

One wouldn't drive an 80 year old car simply because it is unlikely to continue to work, maintaining an old vehicle is difficult. But driving for "novelty" is driving pleasure. People still drive their Model-T's, their Mustangs, their Thunderbirds for PLEASURE, they are simply more difficult to maintain than a song that has been digitized. Enjoying the sound of a 1970's V8 roar to life is definitely pleasure.

But your comparison is flawed. Your appreciation for mechanically poor or technically unskilled music has no bearing on it's quality, only your perception of it's quality. You can like bad music, bad cars, all you want. That doesn't mean that we haven't gotten better at making music, just as we have with card, even music in the same genre.

If you think science ONLY improves, I'd like to remind you of the dark ages.

Question?

How exactly do you make music better? In all fairness, people are going back to vinyl because the quality has been proven to be better. Ever tried using an EQ with digitized music? It sucks to be honest because there isn't much you can do to change it.

 

[Sunseeker]

Question?

How exactly do you make music better? In all fairness, people are going back to vinyl because the quality has been proven to be better. Ever tried using an EQ with digitized music? It sucks to be honest because there isn't much you can do to change it.

Through greater skill and more accurate sound production.

Nobody is going back to vinyl for the quality of the sound. People are going back to vinyl for the novelty. That little bit of scratch, that touch of fuzz, some people enjoy that aspect of music, and so they are using old recording techniques in order to replicate that sound.

You are conflating quality with appreciation, they are not the same and doing so only reinforces this idea that science and art are somehow dichotomous subjects.

 

[Farscape]

Through greater skill and more accurate sound production.

Nobody is going back to vinyl for the quality of the sound. People are going back to vinyl for the novelty. That little bit of scratch, that touch of fuzz, some people enjoy that aspect of music, and so they are using old recording techniques in order to replicate that sound.

You are conflating quality with appreciation, they are not the same and doing so only reinforces this idea that science and art are somehow dichotomous subjects.

Actually I'm not. A friend of mine is a sound engineer and he has said that vinyl actually produces a better sound quality, a more warm and rich sound than digital.

 

[Bedrockgames]

But your comparison is flawed. Your appreciation for mechanically poor or technically unskilled music has no bearing on it's quality, only your perception of it's quality. You can like bad music, bad cars, all you want. That doesn't mean that we haven't gotten better at making music, just as we have with card, even music in the same genre.

If you think science ONLY improves, I'd like to remind you of the dark ages.

My point is technology tends to advance steadily provided there is continuity. Music isn't tech. RPGs are not tech. I was comparing musical composition, not performance, to game design. Bach's cello suites are as good or better than pieces written for the instrument today. Bach isn't objectively worse than Bilky Joel or Sondheim simply because music has 'moved on'. A model T on the other hand is objectively worse than modern vehicles because it doesn't perform as well. That is why I am saying musical composition is a much better analogy than cars. While you have technique, convention and theory supporting music, it isn't the same kind of advancement you see in science . There are technical advance that make a different (new instruments for example) but again, we still perform classical music because much of what changes with music is related more to taste, trends and fashions. But you can still go back to old fashions and ideas in music and make use of them.

 

[ThirdWizard]

"I like it" is not proof of good design. Nor is "I don't like it", for that matter.

Vague mechanics with no guidance as to how to interpret that vagueness is bad game design. In rules light games, for example, you generally get one (or a small number) of baseline rules that would be applied in a variety of situations. So, in a rules light system, hazardous would be a keyword that would link to a general rule that would be applied.

What you don't have is this sort of trailing mechanic that doesn't actually lead anywhere. What does "hazardous" mean in context? Well, we have no idea. I might say it's X or Y. Thus, it's a poorly designed mechanic.

Rulings not rules does not mean that we should go back to poorly written rules that lead nowhere. Rulings are based on sound principles, that are clearly defined by the system. "Hazardous" can mean anything. Does it mean that my character might get cancer 20 years down the line? That I spontaneously explode? What?

The answer is, of course, something interesting within the context of what is going on in the game.

The entire point of building vague mechanics is that events can be adapted to whatever is interesting in the current situation. Perhaps the "hazardous" definition doesn't work well in D&D, I can see that. After all, D&D has very well defined definitions of magic items and spells. However, that doesn't mean that vague rules are bad in all contexts.

For example, in Dungeon World a monster stat block looks something like this:

---

Devourer Solitary, Large, Intelligent, Hoarder
Smash (d10+3 damage) 16 HP 1 Armor
Close, Reach, Forceful
Most folk know that the undead feed on flesh. The warmth, blood and living tissue continue their unholy existence. This is true for most of the mindless dead, animated by black sorcery. Not so the devourer. When a particularly wicked person (often a manipulator of men, an apostate priest or the like) dies in a gruesome way, the dark powers of Dungeon World might bring them back to a kind of life. The devourer, however, does not feed on the flesh of men or elves. The devourer eats souls. It kills with a pleasure only the sentient can enjoy and in the moments of its victims’ expiry, draws breath like a drowning man and swallows a soul. What does it mean to have your soul eaten by such a creature? None dare ask for fear of finding out. Instinct: To feast on souls
• Devour or trap dying soul
• Bargain for a soul’s return

---

What does "Devour or trap dying soul" mean? Whatever the GM needs it to mean. How do you bargain for a soul's return? Does it mean the person is alive, or does that mean the soul merely goes to the afterlife? How do you bargain with an undead monster, anyway? The monster description even notes that nobody knows what happens when the monster eats your soul.

These are all design decisions. The design is to keep the mystery alive for the players. That sense of wonder everyone always wishes they had back. The vagueness of the design allows the DM to craft their game in a way that is internally consistent, exciting, and mysterious.

 

[Sunseeker]

My point is technology tends to advance steadily provided there is continuity. Music isn't tech. RPGs are not tech. I was comparing musical composition, not performance, to game design. Bach's cello suites are as good or better than pieces written for the instrument today. Bach isn't objectively worse than Bilky Joel or Sondheim simply because music has 'moved on'. A model T on the other hand is objectively worse than modern vehicles because it doesn't perform as well. That is why I am saying musical composition is a much better analogy than cars. While you have technique, convention and theory supporting music, it isn't the same kind of advancement you see in science . There are technical advance that make a different (new instruments for example) but again, we still perform classical music because much of what changes with music is related more to taste, trends and fashions. But you can still go back to old fashions and ideas in music and make use of them.

I feel like you're focusing too much on the example and missing the overall point. And I'm really not sure making further statements which would inevitably use more examples would help illuminate things.

Art requires science, it is not some willy-nilly do whatever you want thing.

The fact that their methods of advancement are differen't doesn't make them inherently separate entities.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I

Art requires science, it is not some willy-nilly do whatever you want thing.

.

I never said it was, but I think music and engineering are very different when it comes to advancements. In music, poetry and other arts you have forms that evolve, but you can always freely visit older forms. I can still write a sonnet or opera, even though both music and poetry have evolved. There is more subjectivity in art than science. A lot of what we call advancements, are just trends or changes in taste. Same with game design. We do learn as we go but too often I think people just say ' outdated design' because they don't like something that still has a certain amount of popularity.

and while we are getting lost a bit in examples, I focus on it because it's relevant to what your arguing: that art advances like science. I think I am showing advancements in art are often about subjective sensibilities of the time. There are proper advances in that you can create new tools and options, but the old options still have relevance. That is less true for sciences. Especially when you focus on composition.

 

[Farscape]

I never said it was, but I think music and engineering are very different when it comes to advancements. In music, poetry and other arts you have forms that evolve, but you can always freely visit older forms. I can still write a sonnet or opera, even though both music and poetry have evolved. There is more subjectivity in art than science. A lot of what we call advancements, are just trends or changes in taste. Same with game design. We do learn as we go but too often I think people just say ' outdated design' because they don't like something that still has a certain amount of popularity.

and while we are getting lost a bit in examples, I focus on it because it's relevant to what your arguing: that art advances like science. I think I am showing advancements in art are often about subjective sensibilities of the time. There are proper advances in that you can create new tools and options, but the old options still have relevance. That is less true for sciences. Especially when you focus on composition.

What Bedrock is trying to say, I think, is that the tools of art evolve (paint brush, paints, musical instruments etc) but not the brush stroke.

 

[Umbran]

....one coul definitely listen to an 80 year old song for the pure pleasure of it.

Your appreciation for mechanically poor or technically unskilled music has no bearing on it's quality, only your perception of it's quality.

No, shidaku, I think you're missing his point. If I'm getting him correctly, let me try it this way:

Bach. Brahms. Beethoven. Technically unskilled?

However much you get better sound reproduction, the old design of the music is still amazing.

This is because, however much technology improves, good design and engineering have a human element to them. No amount of new technology saves you from a design that fails on the human portion of the equation. And you can do a lot with an old, outmoded design that just gets the human side of things *right*.