It seems I spend a lot of my life waiting for the rest of my life to happen. That's not to say that I don't do a lot - I lead a pretty active and full life and perhaps that's the reason I notice when I have to wait on things. Often the things I have to wait the longest - not necessarily in actual time - for are the things that seemed like a good or great idea when they got planned just never live up.
So, I got to thinking about making players wait for something - anything - in a game setting. I've decided that's just an asshole thing to do. I've seen people invited to a game and never get to throw a die during the session. I've made players wait for rewards or punishments for their characters, often to pointless or useless effect on the game experience.
Am I condoning instant gratification? HELL NO!!!!! Earning things over the duration is kinda one of the core concepts of gaming. However, I am starting to see the appeal of getting the things you want (not the things you NEED) quickly. Do you need a +5 sword - no, do you need the clues to get you to the next stage of the story - yes.
I'm typing this from my phone as I wait in the CNN Center in Atlanta for my vehicle to return to a drive-able state. So if there are typos and no interesting graphics, sorry.
Friday, April 20, 2012
Monday, April 2, 2012
Rant on the wall of text
Yes, I know this is totally unrelated to gaming, but I've been busy with classwork and moving and taking care of my parents and other more personal stuff - deal.
Part of the aspect of my classes is to respond to online discussion forums. Not a difficult thing to do and not a difficult thing to format properly, especially for people who are working on a Master's degree. Or so I thought...
I would guess that at least half of the responses are walls of test, usually 15-20 lines long and 130-150 characters across. There is usually punctuation and capitalization, but these people do not know how to hit a return key that helps organize their thoughts into coherent groupings. I've seen and used the term "verbal diarrhea", but I don't think this qualifies, wall of text qualifies, but doesn't exactly convey the concept of so many ideas forced into one response block.
So I'm coining the term "wotwork" - Wall Of Text WithOut Return Key. I'm not sure if it will catch on, but hey, maybe it will and I'll at least be sorta not famous.
Part of the aspect of my classes is to respond to online discussion forums. Not a difficult thing to do and not a difficult thing to format properly, especially for people who are working on a Master's degree. Or so I thought...
I would guess that at least half of the responses are walls of test, usually 15-20 lines long and 130-150 characters across. There is usually punctuation and capitalization, but these people do not know how to hit a return key that helps organize their thoughts into coherent groupings. I've seen and used the term "verbal diarrhea", but I don't think this qualifies, wall of text qualifies, but doesn't exactly convey the concept of so many ideas forced into one response block.
So I'm coining the term "wotwork" - Wall Of Text WithOut Return Key. I'm not sure if it will catch on, but hey, maybe it will and I'll at least be sorta not famous.
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