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[witsEkr]

Questions for Puppetmasters (for a UND course discussion)

[Dominic1978]

As my game is still running, I can not yet give you its name.

1. ARGs do not state a specific goal, a win condition or formal guidelines. How do you decide when and what clues to give in the game?

Do you mean give clues for puzzles?
In all honesty, I closely monitor unfiction to see the direction the players going. If it's the wrong direction a clue might pop up.
Mostly this depends on time, if they take "too much" time (depending on the timeline I have planned, or simply my impatience).
As for the goal, in my current game, the players know they have to prevent something from happening, as is stated from the beginning (during the course of the game, they had to prevent other things from happening also, as well as make sure other things did happen).

2. How much of the game design is influenced by the actions of the players and how much is pre-determined?

In my case on one hand a lot, on the other very less. The blueprint is there, but players definitely sometimes speculate things that are so good that I act upon that. On the other hand they speculate things that might be so off that I act upon that to come up with something unexpected.
I noticed that during the game, players have influenced the game (whether they know it or not).


3. If you have maintained a leader board, describe the scoring system used.

My game does not have a leaderboard, the game is solely about the player experience and the community aspect. (I originally wanted to have a sort of leaderboard or add things to the individual experience, but things went the other way).



Hope this helps.
If you want to know more about my game, PM me or contact me at dominic.de.haas[at]gmail.com and I can tell you its title and give you a link to the forum topic.

Greets & good luck, Dominic

[edit: forgot to add the questions as the poster asked for - fixed]

[redct]

1. ARGs do not state a specific goal, a win condition or formal guidelines. How do you decide when and what clues to give in the game?

Definitely monitor the players and unfiction. If players go in the wrong direction, you can nudge them in the correct direction - or use it as an opportunity to change your game up a little bit. If the players are taking too long for a puzzle, I'd nudge them. If they solve it in way too little time - well, time to refactor things a bit

2. How much of the game design is influenced by the actions of the players and how much is pre-determined?

That really depends on the game for me. Depending on the type of game, the players could barely influence the story or be the story. In general, I usually have a rough game plan - story points I want to hit - but, from there, it's mostly player determined.

3. If you have maintained a leader board, describe the scoring system used.

N/A

[FLmutant]

1. ARGs do not state a specific goal, a win condition or formal guidelines. How do you decide when and what clues to give in the game?

Not sure I completely agree with the premise (narrative flow helps define the goals and win conditions), but I sense you're asking a question of timing ... what does one do when the players are not progressing or not progressive as fast as you imagined?

Part of that is designed in advance, and part of that is developed in real time as we watch the player's experience: when the "payoff" for the task is static but the "solve" is taking more and more time, you can get lopsided (as some barrier removal is appropriate.)

2. How much of the game design is influenced by the actions of the players and how much is pre-determined?

Vastly different from game to game, even among the same creator. Most frequently (but not always) the game is on tracks of a sort (but you've granted yourself permission to rethink anything that isn't launched yet, and giving the community maximum flexibility on how we get to those points.) Sometimes that permission to rethink can be considerable (like changing who the villian of the story is) based upon the way it has actually played out with the audience.