Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Snarf Zagyg" data-source="post: 9107757" data-attributes="member: 7023840">Because agency is not an absolute. It's not something objective. You cannot measure agency in metric units of "agentums," can you?Oh, that game has 32 kilo-agentums.Instead, it's about the subjective feelings of the participants. To use the most obvious example, agency is about whether the player believes that they have choices that meaningfully impact the play experience.Whether the player (1) believes that they have choices, and (2) thinks that those choices are impacting the play experience is a subjective quality that will vary from player to player.From the perspective of a player playing a game, there is no difference between a pre-designed map with an ogre on the left and an empty room on the right, as opposed to a quantum ogre, unless the player knows that their choice is not meaningful. While we can certainly discuss best practices and why certain styles might produce better outcomes than others (both generally and specifically), it doesn't change the issue from the subjective experience of the player. Which is, in the end, what matters.Which is why all of this conversation which focuses on "player agency" is bunkum. It's the substitution of jargon for what people actually want to discuss. Do you like a certain style of game? Great! Talk about that, and why. I bet you can without using "player agency."</blockquote>