This Man Is God.
Seraphic8X
Join Date: 2002-06-15 Member: 771Members
Join Date: 2002-06-15 Member: 771Members
<a href='http://www.sirlin.net/Features/feature_GameBalancePart1.htm' target='_blank'>http://www.sirlin.net/Features/feature_Gam...alancePart1.htm</a>
Pretty good. Read his other stuff too.
A lot of what he says there has a lot of links to what we've been trying to do and what we have experienced. Read the part about the "trick", remind you of 1.04 jp/hmg?
<i>Hire excellent testers, treat them well, and motivate them to break the game, design-wise as well as bug-wise.</i>
Pretty good. Read his other stuff too.
A lot of what he says there has a lot of links to what we've been trying to do and what we have experienced. Read the part about the "trick", remind you of 1.04 jp/hmg?
<i>Hire excellent testers, treat them well, and motivate them to break the game, design-wise as well as bug-wise.</i>
Comments
<!--emo&;)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/wink.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wink.gif'><!--endemo-->
I don't blame you <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif'><!--endemo-->
Pretty good. Read his other stuff too.
A lot of what he says there has a lot of links to what we've been trying to do and what we have experienced. Read the part about the "trick", remind you of 1.04 jp/hmg?
<i>Hire excellent testers, treat them well, and motivate them to break the game, design-wise as well as bug-wise.</i> <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
/me nods
I've read this one before. It's very good advice.
<img src='http://www.sirlin.net/Features/RubinsFans2.jpg' border='0' alt='user posted image'>
<!--QuoteBegin--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->Female fans of top Magic the Gathering player Ben Rubin await his arrival at a Pro Tour tournament in Sydney, Australia.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Thats gold Jerry, gold!
<img src='http://www.sirlin.net/Features/RubinsFans2.jpg' border='0' alt='user posted image'>
<!--QuoteBegin--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->Female fans of top Magic the Gathering player Ben Rubin await his arrival at a Pro Tour tournament in Sydney, Australia.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Thats gold Jerry, gold! <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
Wow! I would never have guessed that. I never thought playing a card/board/whatever game would make you popular with 'teh womens'.
Thats a very good article. I like his point about imbalance so much its balanced.
Balance is like entropy. The more balanced it is, the more likely it is to be imbalanced (rigid game structure leads to investigation of sploits) and the more imbalanced it is, the more likely it is to be balanced. Very deep.
I played Magic till about 8th grade. :-P
Yep photoshop. the background of his picture really doesn't go with his GREEN shirt, or maybe he doesn't have any fashion sence... <!--emo&:0--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/wow.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wow.gif'><!--endemo-->
I'm not saying theres anything wrong with the article itself.
What annoyed me was that there was a period where someone would post something about balance and then <i>prove</i> they we're right by brandishing a sirlin link like a weapon or a holy cross.
And this happened more then once. Just started doin my head in <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif'><!--endemo-->
Skulks would move as fast as the game's engine physically allows, meaning the only chance marines have to hit one with an LMG is if the skulk stops moving.
HMGS would have a 360 degree spray effect.
Fades can Blink and walk through walls.
Onos are completely invincible.
If anyone took this seriously you deserve to be riddiculed my friend.
But seriously, this guy had some good points. And he made me want to play warcraft 3 again <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif'><!--endemo-->
Smart move <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif'><!--endemo-->
Why? His work is really good and to the point. He makes a very clear argument for all his points.
Yep photoshop. the background of his picture really doesn't go with his GREEN shirt, or maybe he doesn't have any fashion sence... <!--emo&:0--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/wow.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wow.gif'><!--endemo--> <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
fashion schmation. Who cares bout looking good when you have your computer right in front of you <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif'><!--endemo-->
Yep photoshop. the background of his picture really doesn't go with his GREEN shirt, or maybe he doesn't have any fashion sence... <!--emo&:0--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/wow.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wow.gif'><!--endemo--> <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
fashion schmation. Who cares bout looking good when you have your computer right in front of you <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif'><!--endemo--> <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
hehe true... unless you constantly take photos of yourself with a web-cam.
<!--emo&;)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/wink.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wink.gif'><!--endemo-->
Why? His work is really good and to the point. He makes a very clear argument for all his points. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
Well, his articles are to a big part one-sided; he seems to believe that good game design can be brought down to a few tried and true formulas - it can't. Design is a creative process, and presenting a number of methods as 'correct' solutions to a problem (such as balancing, or the 'right' gamestyle), as he does all the time, is infuriating.
Quoting Warren Spector:
<!--QuoteBegin--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->I'll let you in to a secret: We're making all this up as we go. What works for one [development] group may fail for the other.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
What you have to note is that this article isnt a bible on game <b>design</b>, it only comments on <b>balancing</b>. And if there's anything you can learn from this or any discussion on game balance, it's that balance is not the be all / end all of game design. The term 'balancing' can also be applied to many very different aspects of gameplay so it's essential to be clear on what exactly you're discussing.
"A multiplayer game is balanced if a reasonably large number of options available to the player are viable"
I like this quote. This quote concerns the balance of different options available to all players, for example: Weapons in a deathmatch game, strategies in a RTS, or characters in a fighter. The crux of this statement is that these options do not have to be perfectly balanced, the game only needs enough viable options to make it interesting. Applied to NS, this means not every strategy has to be viable, not every upgrade has to worth its cost, not every weapon has to be used. There only has to be enough variety to make the game strategically interesting.
The idea of Alien vs. Marine balance however is a different use of the term 'balance'. The choice of race is not an option open to all players, as you cannot have mixed teams or race vs. same-race. In a competition environment, teams will play an alien round and a marine round, meaning the game is always 'fair'. However for competition's sake the 2 races have to be at least close in strength, because of the way the scoring system works.
NS in a clan environment is like tennis. In one round you're serving, in the next round your opponent serves. If the advantage/dissadvantage of serving is too great, the game doesn't work at competition level, because when players are near eachother in ability, games end in a draw. 1.04 suffered from this problem, at a high level games would end in draws with double marine wins, as the marine team were too strong. The 2 races do not have to be perfectly balanced - after all, tennis works at a competitive level - but they have to be close enough that either has a good chance of winning. This is a different type of balance to the balance sirlin's article deals with. Infact i'd say it was more of a scoring issue than a balance issue.
I've looked but there isnt really that much preeching in there. Only in the closing paragraph does he get formulaic - some of it is good advice, some of it is good observation, some of it is debatable. But the more generalized ideas in the rest of the article are a good read.
Some people might dissagree with his thoughts on testing. Then again, what he describes is basically what the vets program is doing - getting experienced players to try and break the game. Minus the whole getting payed and getting treated well part of course :)
The idea of having experienced players, especially recruiting players on a clan by clan basis to have them play scrimms, is imo an excellent way of testing and beats the pants off other testing procedures i've been involved in. Where testers were basically picked at random, we played a single, scheduled, unorganised pub game every week, and our comments on gameplay were ignored (They only wanted a forum full of bug reports).
The Capcom principle is just an example, he isnt preaching it as a formula for success. Frankly, being an avid fighting game fan i'd say this idea really only applies to their licensed+vs. series games. SF3 and even the alphas are much more subtle, and since i enjoy those games far more than the extremely-OTT vs. series, perhaps that says something about this method of design :)
Why? His work is really good and to the point. He makes a very clear argument for all his points. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
If you re-read my post you'll see I have no issue with the article at all. All in all it's a very good and interesting article.
My bugbear, again as I stated, is in the way it was used in these forums. Posters would link to it like it automatically made what ever they we're saying gospel truth.
Which quite often wasn't the case <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif'><!--endemo-->
Why? His work is really good and to the point. He makes a very clear argument for all his points. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
If you re-read my post you'll see I have no issue with the article at all. All in all it's a very good and interesting article.
My bugbear, again as I stated, is in the way it was used in these forums. Posters would link to it like it automatically made what ever they we're saying gospel truth.
Which quite often wasn't the case <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif'><!--endemo--> <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
I wasn't using it to make any points. Plus, this was intended for the veteran's forum. I don't know why it was phased to Off-Topic, because the point of the post was to provide some insight on the vets' job, not to hear calls from the peanut gallery.
Bugbear?
Heheh, it's a gremlin from English literature. In that context it means "The thing that really irritates me".
I know what Pheonix is getting at, the sirlin articles have been posted several times on the general forum (At least once by Coil if i recall). Since then, the link has been used a few times as a 1-line answer to any discussion that is vauguely similar. They are good articles but, they aren't the end of the discussion. In particular, sections of the playing to win article really can't be applied to 'organic' games such as NS and other games that have ongoing development.
I nearly dropped a sirlin link into the recent "Siege is overpowered" thread, that would have been worth a giggle.
Heheh, it's a gremlin from English literature. In that context it means "The thing that really irritates me".
I know what Pheonix is getting at, the sirlin articles have been posted several times on the general forum (At least once by Coil if i recall). Since then, the link has been used a few times as a 1-line answer to any discussion that is vauguely similar. They are good articles but, they aren't the end of the discussion. In particular, sections of the playing to win article really can't be applied to 'organic' games such as NS and other games that have ongoing development.
I nearly dropped a sirlin link into the recent "Siege is overpowered" thread, that would have been worth a giggle. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
The playing to win article has a tremendous insight into the state of NS. No wait, it applies to every game. All games have winners and losers, the article just describes how people acheive a win.
I would talk about a conflict between two certain player groups in the NS community where the article comes into play bigtime, that happened a while ago, but that would be opening a pandora's box.