On 'Adult Wednesday Addams'

This may be a little unrelated to the video games or education that I tend to riff on, but I just want to take a minute to dissect a character. I really like the Addams family and after seeing the great Wednesday vs. Catcallers I finally sat down and watched the rest of the series so far. I think both the little progression in finding whats compelling about the character and where she seems to have settled are interesting, and while the ideas here may not be new I just want to try and articulate what I see happening.

Just a normal Monday morning? No?

Ok, so first we're definitely dealing with a version drawing more from the movie versions of Wednesday than the original show, where Wednesday was a happy little girl who happened to like creepy things. Going for the unflappable, super competent creepiness is fine, I liked the movies too.
In that first episode, there's the little bit of backstory and establishing the character and how she relates to others. Most of the humor here is just about how she's different and about misunderstandings;  the gag bickering with her dead gran, misinterpreting 'night owls', the one roommates' obliviousness to the 'shit where I eat' comment, etc. Its situational comedy it every sense.

Its the second episode with the job interview that it gets more interesting. I mean there's the mildly forced 'maggot gets the corpse' and the nice little touches like the unsettling in its mundanity 'I love being tested'. Handling the phone interview is the first taste of where things seem headed though; here's an interviewer in a nominal position of power over her and has a casual disdain and lack of respect, as most people are very familiar with. Theres that dismissive manner, questioning of abilities, and attempts to maintain control. Through it all, it slides off Wednesday and then, when the interviewer is at her most annoying and demanding, she firmly demonstrates she can do the job. Specifically, that she is unmoved by petty insults and concerns and is willing to address deeper issues its not polite to talk about as well as grounding them in her larger, morbid perspective.

Much of humor is about breaking expectations after all,
and hers are broken

This is where this recurring pattern starts; this situation of Wednesday being confronted by some mundane annoyance or unpleasant person and responding confidently and decisively in a way rooted in her unique perspective. I mean, sure her consistent triumphs could be a bit Mary Sue, but the manner in which she succeeds is what is interesting. Sure, she does use whistle ex machine to deal with the dog walker, but generally whether its someone actively hostile, like at planned parenthood, or she is trying to reassure someone, such as when babysitting or getting a haircut, we see her brooch unsettling topics, uncompromisingly stick to her principles, take a broad perspective, and, beyond drawing her own strength from certainty in that view, attempt to use that perspective to reassure others.

"Everyone is destined to die alone"

I think she's interesting as a character because her sense of empowerment isn't in just dealing with these issues, but in the way she is immediately clearly not 'normal' yet is sure of herself and succeeds on her terms. Wednesday isn't perfect (though perhaps super competent in certain areas) but a person with her own values, opinions, rules, and preferences like everyone else. Its just that hers a clearly different from what's considered normal, and this helps us identify with her and makes it satisfying when she does stick to her principles. She unapologetic in the ways she's different and uses it to solve her problems. She draws strength from her differences rather than questioning herself.

Even more so than the power fantasy of things like have the resources to respond to the catcallers, I think its this self assurance and insight and quick witted...ness that make her a satisfying protagonist to follow and project on to. You look at the immediate, clear way she deals with things like the internet date and see someone secure in themselves and pursuing their own goals an not putting up with other people's nonsense or flawed perceptions of her.

"I thought you were one of those...suicide girls."
"I'm not that kind of girl, Kyle; I don't take my life on the first date"

I think its this certainty and strength that more people wish they had.

A few final thoughts:
The continuing morbid flavor over everything is still great and adds to the humor, I don't want to dismiss that. Moreover, looking at what most people in this society consider the darkest, most depressing, and most uncomfortable to discuss topics and not only reveling in them but finding them reassuring only reinforces all of this.

Its nice to see the subversion of expectations more recently with the reality star.

The types of issues shes dealing with also says something about the demographic of the audience, so theres a discussion to be had over if this kind of confidence power fantasy is more or less appealing to them than other potential audiences...



Anyway, maybe I'm just projecting too much or other people find something else appealing here.
Let me know what you think in the comments.

Addiction and improvement

This post was prompted by David Wong's new article today on addiction over at Cracked. Let me start by saying I'm a big fan of Cracked, and particularly of David Wong's articles in particular. The format and style of these posts themselves shows I may read Cracked too much. But this particular article's ending disappointed me so hard I had to respond to it.

Hopefully that doesn't just mean I've been on the internet too long
[source]

The Article
See, a lot of Wong's other articles manage to bring you along as he weaves a big overarcing story of some large aspect of society, with just enough personality and self-awareness/humor to keep it entertaining and perhaps 'palatably preachy' and try to offer some hope or way out at the end. And today's on addiction is no different, except at the end.

Wong lays out his story/model/arguments about addiction (loosely defined) and its complex role in modern society and economy. To summarize, it focuses on how advances in understanding it and how to foster such responses, how businesses use that knowledge to make money, and how society is ok with it as long as it increases stability (even at the cost of individual freedom or agency). I can follow that, and it makes some sense. My issue is the downer conclusion it ends on, about how the economic and social incentives will make companies (and other organizations) keep using this knowledge about how to shape behavior to short circuit our reward systems; where Wong asserts people will stop trying to improve because they will have easier options for the same rewards. And oh gods, its so horrible... (slightly paraphrased)

To which I have to say "Bwah?"

You heard me! Bwah?!

 
My Bias and Problem
The thing is, when he starts talking about how to shape behavior, that is literally what I am working on, so the discussion is much less abstract for me. If you recall, I'm working on designing educational games. Specifically I'm coming from a psych background and trying to figure out how to apply what we know from cognitive psychology, combine it with game design theory, and learn from current commercial games in order to produce educational games that are both educationally effective and actually, you know, good games that are fun.

In Wong's model, part of my job is to be an "addiction expert" and figure out how to learn from psychology and other successful games so I can make new games that will hook players, but use that time to do something good for them, like teach them.

"Got math? Well do you? Cause I will SUCK YOUR D-"
"Ok, we may have gone too far..."

And thats my biggest problem with Wong's conclusion; it seems to overlook the potential of these methods to do good, and cast them solely as the downfall of society. It hits me like saying the internet, or TV, or any given technology that is largely being used poorly and having negative consequences is, in itself, bad and will be the end of society. Every time the technology being considered gets more powerful, that threat seems more plausible, but the thought behind it remains just as misguided.

I still think technology is inherently neutral, and can be used for good or bad ends. The standard dramatic example is that splitting the atom can be used to power cities or level them. But its true of technologies that aren't physical as well. The same kinds of superficial gamification that companies use to sell more products can be used to make online communities less toxic, for example.

Somehow previous efforts weren't super effective.

Wong is right to be concerned about the incentives in place for people in power to use new knowledge to maintain the status quo and reduce freedom for those not in power. That is a worrying system and set of implications.

However, I can't help but see the potential of applying this same knowledge to help people and empower them. To motivate them to exercise, learn, develop skills, work with others, and otherwise benefit. Sure, there will be that arms race among and with commercial products, but looking at video game design makes me optimistic about that. There, gamification is a big deal, but those who research such things know that superficial gamification, the basic addictive features most people think of, are only so effective .

A Possible Solution
I think Wong's fear suggests its own solution. Hes afraid that we've found how to short-circuit the reward pathway and it'll damage our progress; that people will be able to artificially get the same rewards from less effort so they'll stop improving themselves to get natural rewards.

So why not artificially reward self improvement as well?
To me the natural solution is to use this knowledge to reinforce natural responses and super charge that cycle. To compete with these incentives directly rather than just give up. Even if it leaves people the same as now, it would avert the dystopia hes afraid of.

...though it may look like someone else's prediction.

I know the downer may be just to get people's attention; to get them to actually care about this and think about things that they normally don't. But I can't help but object that he fails to mention the possible upsides. Since thats what I'm trying to work on, and all.


What do you think?
Is it all gloom and doom? Am I over optimistic?
Is it all worrying over nothing? Have I been on the internet too much?
Let me know in the comments.

The ultimate science game is 20 Questions?

So as a game designer who is intensely interested in the scientific process and has studied the psychology of scientific reasoning, I'm interested in making a game to teach science. I don't mean teach facts about a particular field, I mean a game that embodies, represents, and can be used to teach about the process of science. The cycle of observation, interpreting that observation, testing that interpretation with another observation, and so on that we use to understand how the world we live in works. I think that would be super awesome and provide a sorely needed service.

Yes, geeking out about the scientific method and
trying to make it a board game may be even stronger
nerd credentials than previously presented, I suppose

This post isn't about the side project game I'm working on, though. Well, except for context: I was thinking about how to do this, and being the big dreamer I am, my initial impulse was to not just represent the cyclical ongoing process of empirical observation and theory revision, but to have systems in the game to show the interplay of surrounding factors as well. For example,  needing some theories in other domains first (like plate tectonics and hereditary traits for the theory of evolution), how new theories have to address all the evidence for current theories, how past theories accumulated anomalous data until a new theory was more attractive, and so on. So after the initial rush of sketching out these systems, I realized this would be a rather complex game.

Not that I don't enjoy complex games.

That's of course fine for a general boardgame, but if I wanted to communicate these concepts to kids as young as possible (which I do) this is not an optimal approach. What I really needed was more a progression of games/activities. So ideally, something only verbal with no pieces at all to get players thinking in a scientific way, then a core game that was just the scientific process, and then expansions for those other systems that could later be bolted on; so once players were familiar with the core game, depth and some complexity could be added, to provide a richer experience and model of the process. (So as a side note, I'm fiddling with just the core game now.)

But when I tried to think of that initial activity, I realized it already exists; The game I want to start with, thats a verbal game with no pieces required, that has players iterate through this cycle, and that involves some critical thinking to refine an idea and progress. Its called 20 Questions.

Yes, the game that proved that one friend is always thinking about Batman.

Think about the goal of 20 questions and how it works for everyone guessing;
You are trying to determine information about an unknown thing. To do this, you get to conduct a number of tests that tell you limited information about the thing (ie yes or no), and then use the information for all the previous tests to devise the next test. You go on figuring out what questions to ask and using the responses to ask more questions until you know the information you want, and that is just such a nice idealized version of the general scientific process in playable form. It makes me giddy, just thinking about it.

But it gets even better. Think about when you play 20 questions and how it progresses. It always starts with the same, practically formalized questions: "Person, place, or thing", "real or fictional", "larger or smaller than a breadbox", "living or dead". Then some other broad but less used questions, and eventually you are asking questions you have probably never asked in a previous game.

Ok, so a real living person who is sort of famous
from the internet, for youtube videos...
Have they ever done a video in peanutbutter face?

Which is just so appropriate. First you have the big general tests that are used on everything, because they are so general, and these are time-tested...tests that have persisted because they are effective. Then the main categories within those distinctions. The breadbox one strikes me as particularly funny, because its a common question/test based on a reference thats outdated but is still used in this one field as a standard convention. That may be funnier to people in some fields than others (or anyone using the Imperial system over metric).

But as you progress into tests that will be useful for addressing this specific, novel problem, there stop being stock tests. You have to think about similar things you've dealt with before, or generate entirely new questions based on what you think the possibilities are. And that even involves evaluating what the remaining possibilities are and what test would distinguish between them.

Ok, so yes to the peanut butter, but not a vlogbrother.
You faked me out. Hmm...was it for comedic effect or cosmetic?

I mean when I thought about it, I just couldn't come up with a better lightweight activity to express science as a game. Its just so good. A game where the point is literally to discover some piece of information about the world (it may only be what someone else is thinking of and of limited utility, but as a psychologist its still totally worth knowing). And the way you do this is a cycle of test, refine your idea of what the possibilities are, then test again. And sometimes you get a response that makes you completely rethink what those possibilities are.

Cosmetic? geez I am not up to date on my peanut butter facial youtubers...

And you can play cooperatively with others, where you are all trying to think of good questions and collaborating. And its such a general game, it demonstrates how this kind of thinking can be applied across many, many areas. Its just so good.

And as boggled as I am by how well this ubiquitous game presents scientific reasoning, I am at least as boggled by how much less interesting and effective the standard ways of teaching "the scientific method" are. Even more so when I searched for other games on it.

"Look on my gamified quizzes, ye designers, and despair!"

Like a lot of others in science and science communication, I think the science is awesome, in the full, outdated, drop-your-jaw-and-stare meaning of that word. From the impressive feats to the everyday improvements, its just great. And all that progress comes from this empirical, critical process.

I think its a great disservice to reduce that process to something students memorize, regurgitate, and then think of as "something scientists do in a lab", something separated from their own life.

This is something people do all the time, but don't think about as 'scientific' since its not in a lab or a classroom. I think (perhaps naively) that if you get people, especially when they're young, to see science as how we learn about the world, as something they are already doing outside the classroom, and at its core as that process of making sense of the world based on what we've observed of it, then they'll respond better to it. It can become a thing like running or talking or reading,  that everyone does, but some do professionally, rather than something scary you don't understand.

And I think more people like that would be a good thing.
Even if they still argued just as much but about what findings meant and methods. 

And Hank could have even more people calling for an encore.

What do you think?
Is 20 questions not as awesome as I think? Can you read even more into it?
Is there some other game that embodies scientific thinking even better or more portably?
Or do you just have a story of how science is awesome?
Let me know.

Film Adaptation is like Science Communication

That's the thought I had this morning, catching up on reactions and commentary from various places to David Goyer's recent comments. I mean, I was also revisiting the ongoing story that the reason DC can't seem to make good DC movies (that aren't Batman) while Marvel is doing gangbusters is that they don't respect, know, or know what to do with the characters.
Its an unfortunately well developed narrative at this point, with a history.



"You want me to write a scene where Braniac is razzalin' polar bears?" (source, image)

But this particular iteration hit me differently, because the bits about Martian Manhunter being goofy or needing to (essentially) be a completely new character to be in their movie  actually reminded me some questions I get about educational games and approaches. Not just because I'm self-centered, but because of the premises.
People ask "how do you make science interesting?" or how you "slip in" "stealth learning" into a design. They ask these questions where there's this tacit, implicit assumption science isn't interesting, and you have to "hide the learning" to appeal to kids.

And that assumption is just friggin' wrong.
Like super, super  w  r  o  n  g.
(And I don't mean that in an insulting way; it super easy to see the stigma attached to educational games and the history of poor quality, and assume it is because they are educational, rather than other factors.)

And rejecting that premise affects my work.
I made a biology game, and I know biology is interesting because I'm surrounded by biologists.
I'm surrounded by people who think its so interesting, they want to spend their whole lives studying it. People who tell me cool things about it all the time, and talk to each other about how to find out even more cool things about it.

So to me its not "How do I make biology interesting?"
Its "How do I show people how interesting biology is?"

Specifically, its usually how do I show them quickly and clearly, since a) what they've been seeing so far hasn't grabbed them and b) I don't have the years to go into it that the biologist have spent seeing how neat it is.

To do that the place you have to start is finding the core of why is this cool, why it matters, why should you care. You have to find those hooks within the foundations of what you're actually looking at, find those things the audience can connect with, and bring those out. You make those clear and get them on board, and from there you can build out wherever complex or crazy place you want to go, be it evolutionary biology or:



...and now that you've got how hes a child trying to prove himself to his parents,
and learning to deal with problems more maturely, as most people can relate to,
let me tell you about how he's a space god in a distant galaxy
who flies and shoots lightning....

If I start from the premise there is nothing valuable or appealing to the audience in the subject at all, that I have to add something completely new to get them to care...why am I even trying to do this other than to make money? And why would I think it would work, even then?
(Also; nothing the audience can relate to at all?
Is the story about friggin' Varelse? Try harder.)

Its self-defeating. If you don't think theres a reason to care the subject, even if there is one, you won't be trying to show it to the audience. And whatever you are getting them to care about isn't from the subject, so even if you do get the audience engaged, they're not engaging with that subject.
Even if its name is in the title, its gonna feel tacked on, arbitrary, and unimportant, because that's what you've communicated.
Its like games where you do the crappy "learning" bit to be allowed the reward of paying the "fun part". It communicates the enduring the learning part is work that you get rewarded for.



The term in some academic literature for this is "chocolate covered broccoli".
That being in peer reviewed journals makes me happy inside. image

Similarly, treating the title character as something you have to shoehorn into the movie you actually wanted to make (or think will sell) both tells new people the character is not interesting and tells fans you don't want their money; whatever they saw in the character is not what you're interested in, so they can just crawl back into their basements or whatever (because being fans makes them socially awkward and their dollars worth less than sex-having 'real people' dollars...somehow).

So yeah, to me the problem that a lot of educational games have is kind of the same problem DC has, and its why Marvel is kicking their ass.

And it comes to the forefront in comments like these where the people at DC explicitly don't think characters that have been around for 60+ years can be appealing. I highlight that number not because  history makes it good, but if a character has been around that long there's probably something distinct there to work with or people would have just forgotten about him. It also means theres a lot of work to draw on to find something you can use, before throwing up your hands that's its not doable.
I'm saying just looking at the surface of it and throwing it out as ridiculous is the easy (and stupid and less profitable) way out.

Yes, I may have just called the convoluted 2003 Hulk the easy way out
compared to the more straightforward 2008 model.
The irony's not lost on me. image

If you don't see anything appealing about the character other than recognition their name has and the spectacle they provide, those are going to be the truest parts of the movie, and thats usually not a good thing. Even if you try to give it depth beyond that, the fact you feel you need to make up deeper stuff means it won't "feel" like its that character to the people who are familiar with it. And that's the best case, assuming it works and isn't just terrible.

Of course if you make a story people can connect with
you don't even need name and spectacle.
And if you want to see how far characters and spectacle can get you,
just look at almost any Pixar film. image

Just to be clear, I'm not saying reboots, reimaginings, new ideas, and so on are bad or you need to be slavishly loyal to source material. I thought the Mandarin was great in Iron Man 3 and even in educational games there tends to be some tradeoffs in accuracy for vastly better gameplay. I'm saying, as other have said before, you have to be loyal to the concept. If you get the core of what a character is about, what they do, and why people connect to them, you can put them anywhere, anytime, and make it work. If you don't get it, it can look as awesome and iconic as ever and still be an existentially depressing level of bad. (Look DC, other people screw up, too!)

You can make money with a spectacle and a name. But you can build a beloved franchise with an actual character that people care about.
The same way you can make an "educational game" slapping quizzes into something fun, and try to sell it. But if you make a concept playable, and show students why they should care, they may actually learn something rather than just memorizing it.


So what do you think?
Now that its written out, I'm  aware how gloriously nerdy it is to see the parallel between how to explain science effectively to the person-on-the-street and how to translate a superhero (or sci-fi or other fantastical tale) into a movie that same hypothetical person-on-the-street would enjoy. Yet currently, both are huge opportunities, and still often mishandled.
Do you think its this failure to respect the subject behind the failures? Some other issue?
Something else behind the successes? (cause we've seen skilled, engaged people with lots of talent and resources hit and miss =P )
Let me know in the comments.

My Favorite Superhero

Lately (when not working) I've been marinating in commentary and analysis of superheroes. I recently revisited the great Death and Return of Superman and found that since then Max had posted the DAROS pitch and Regarding Clark. Then there's been the general ongoing stream of stuff in pop culture on the sites I frequent like Cracked, The Escapist and to a lesser extent The Mary Sue.

So superheroes have been on my mind. And after watching Max explain the appeal behind his clear favorite, I tried to reflect on mine and it wasn't initially clear.

No Sue, I'm not talking about you.

I feel I should preface this with "I did not grow up reading comic books". I was watching Batman: TAS, and Spiderman and X-men on TV, I was playing video games, but I wasn't actually reading the source comics. Even in college when I did get more into it, I was reading trade paperbacks of miniseries, which I still prefer; Watchmen, The Long Halloween, Barry Ween, Sandman, all the previously mentioned Warren Ellis stuff, etc.. I never even tried to get into main continuities. I already knew the characters, and prefer defined stories with them, personally.

Now a little while ago if I'd thought about this, it would've been Deadpool; he's an entertaining and interesting character. But while I enjoy reading deadpool, after Max's more analytical philosophical breakdown of Clark, Deadpool didn't feel like someone I could get behind in that kind of way.

Though I do fully support irreverence, silliness, awesomeness and fun.

It should come as no surprise that after deeper reflection on themes and characters that  I settled comfortably on Elijah Snow. It feels like this has allot to do with both his approach and Planetary's lack of the "the status quo is god" type of thing inherent in so much of superhero comics. That tropes's not a new observation or even a bad thing for those stories, but when I look at what speaks to, resonates with, and inspires me its not going to be that. Its not going to be someone "Healing america by beating people up" as Nextwave put it.

Ah, that old chestnut. Emphasis on the nut.

Its not even going to be The Authority, trying to change the world by beating people up. That proactive rather than reactive approach is closer, but still not right. Its going to be someone trying to do the right thing, which sometimes may involve force but that not the goal; thats in service of the bigger goal.

That's why it has to be Elijah Snow.

The stories of Elijah Snow are not about "fighting crime"; they are about going out into the unknown and finding secrets and discovering new knowledge. Given superpowers he doesn't become a cop, but a scientist and an explorer. Hes a detective, but hes not batman tracking a thief; hes the mystery archeologist tracking the past to unveil it to the present, in order to improve the present, if only through increased knowledge.

(Oh, uh, big Planetary SPOILERS ahead, by the way.)
(Seriously, go read it, its great. If you want spoiler-ific reasons, for all the good I'm saying, he does beat up Dracula and perpetrate other awesomeness. Its a fun ride.)

...like stupidly, over-the-toply, B-movie fun, but also good.

And I know the reasons it can't happen in most comics, that you can only do it in a miniseries, but I love things like the "lifestations" in the 3rd world, that they list in the last issue. For all the problems of post-scarcity, satisfying basic needs like that saves so many more lives than stopping a mugging. And this is a character who will actually do that, and still go on fun adventures.

And he literally kills Reed Richards for being malevolently worse than useless.

And then he kicks him in the crotch.
Its glorious. Go read it.
(Yes, I know this isn't Reed or his expy, but the sentiment is there)

But more than the acts, its that core of the character.

"Its a strange world, let keep it that way."
"Saving him means more than yanking him out of there. It means saving his life."
Or just simply puts as  "He saves things"

Its about protecting the world not from destruction, but from deception. The conflict is not with those who take innocent lives and freedom, but those who do so to so many by making the world a dimmer, less wondrous place. Its not even really about "improving the world" itself; its about showing people how great the world is and how it works (though the tech from that makes the world better for people), and recording it for later.

 Like I said, he's a scientist, trying to understand the world and explain it to others to help them. Thats what resonates with me. That's the right thing I like seeing a hero striving to do.

What about you? What hero resonates with you? Lemme know in the comments.

Quick thought: scientific reasoning and reading

I was thinking about science this morning, and came up with something I wish I had during the previous work for my Masters:

"Scientist aren't the only ones who do scientific reasoning any more than book critics are the only ones who read. Sure the critic may read more challenging material and have a richer discussion of what is going on in it, but reading is something your average person does all day everyday from signs to get around to emails and entertainment. It's something you're doing right now without thinking it extraordinary or uncomfortable. So it is with scientific reasoning too; when defined as 'drawing conclusions based on previous observations and experience' then most problem solving or even wondering if something is true would fall under this label; its why you could say (if pretentious) that you were 'theorizing that X is Y' or 'hypothesizing this author is wrong'.

So when we talking about how people use scientific reasoning, its not about just scientists, but about how people solve problems and make sense of the world they live in everyday."

That would have been a stronger, cleaner introduction to the topic than what I went with at the time, which relied more on examples than a good analogy. I really like the reading analogy to strongly say that this is a common practice, though there are specialized practitioners.

My focus may be more on 'critical thinking' and 'problem solving' now, but its all related. And I still think if we can understand how people do these types of things and how to either teach or help them to do them better, the benefits will more than pay for the effort.

Just a quick thought.

Holy crap.

Warning: This is a profoundly affecting game about a serious topic. Theres even a "trigger warning" because if you have had a traumatic experience, this could be bad for you to play. Its a very powerful experience for allot of people. So that said, its here:

The Day the Laughter Stopped

And in the interests of not spoiling more than with tags, I'll continue below.



























Cheery name, isn't it? Holy crap that's an effective game. I'm not trying to be callous about the topic, of course; its an important statement about an important and horrible problem. The maker talks more deeply about it here and continues here, and I would recommend both of them, if you have the time. I'm not going to be able to add a lot to all the consideration he's given it and expounded upon there.

But I felt like I had to share it somewhere, because its such a work of art, a powerful piece of communication, as I said, such an effective game. After the initial reactions to the narrative, I was struck by that part of it. Its so simple, but so moving, and that's so impressive. Its very clearly conveying a certain idea about this horrible thing, and that's why people have such strong reactions to it.

Ok, let me stop gushing for a minute though and point out some things this highlights, upon reflection. I was just talking again  about "what is a game" with some other academics the other day, so I'm in a philosophical frame of mind. Two things that are very interesting looking at this game compared to others are how "your choices don't matter" and "you can't select some options".  Now, those quotes are there because, within the narrative of the game, those may be correct, but for the experience of the player they are not. In Rules of Play, theres that talk about the game being the interaction between the players and the rules, not the trappings; two chess masters can play chess by speaking moves to each other and its as much chess as playing with a board. But here is an entirely different example of that idea; the game is not just the story, but your experience going through it. Even if you can't resist, your clicking it and experience of that lack of ability is an important part of the game.

Now there may still be some confusion about "interactive fiction" vs "a game", or how one choice makes something a game or whatever. But if theres a discussion about two designs that are mechanically equivalent, but the player experience differs, and someone asks if the players' experience of them matters as long as the outcome's the same...this is the over-the-top answer to drive home just how important player experience is. Its so much more affecting that just reading the story, and the reactions people have when the "choice" doesn't work shows just how much the experience matters, not just the on-screen/in-game outcome. Man. Its a hell of a thing.

Just wanted to share.

(Again, I'm not trying to be callous by not talking about the content, but A) Hypnotic Owl covers it really well, B) I too have closely known people hurt by this so, unfortunately, just how horrible, rapes (and things surrounding them) are was not a revelation or new idea to me. But how effective the design was was something new, hence my rambling about that.)

Bioshock Infinite's Vigors

I finally played through Bioshock Infinite (I had been waiting until I would have some time to focus on it, so over break I binged over the course a couple days) and now I'm catching up on all the commentary and reactions to it, which are quite interesting.

Theres one thing I want to comment on though, and that's Infinite's vigors (their version of plasmids from Bioshock 1). The (entirely accurate) criticism floating around is that they're not really part of the world and they're out of place and make allot less sense than in Bioshock 1. In 1, they were integral to the story, and part of the narrative was the consequences of their existence, while here you get superpowers casually, none of the other inhabitants have them (even though you can buy them out of very common vending machines), and basically the game gives them to you the protagonist, then ignores them.

Now, from the story, narrative, and world-building perspectives that's just awful. Its weird and distracting and what is the point of it? However, from a gameplay perspective, I can say the game would absolutely have been less interesting without them. Whatever else Bioshock Infinite is, its a shooter and allot of play time is in combat that is significantly richer, more interesting, and more engaging for having vigors.

To me its about doing something because of the medium, to make it more effective, rather than the message. For example, I vaguely remember Faulkner originally wanted one of his books to be printed with each character's thoughts and speaking in a different color ink (but didn't because it was too expensive). It seems like if you had a book that made a big deal about the symbolism of color and it was intimately connected to the characters and an integral part of the work, and it was very well received. Then with your next book, even though it had nothing to do with color (but was similar in other themes) you still used different colors because it did make it easier to keep track of things and made the book easier to follow and enjoy. That's what it makes me think of; something done due to the medium (in this case shooter) to make it more enjoyable that isn't well connected to the story.

(And yes, I know the vigors are more problematic because they exist in world, while the ink colors wouldn't necessarily be, but whatever)

Now whether, you think the detriment to the story is worth the benefit to the gameplay is an interesting and personal question and matter of priorities. As I said, I think it would have been less interesting and fun without them, personally, and didn't really care that the story ignored them.

But what about you? What do you think about the balance of narrative and gameplay concerns?
Here, in other specific games, or generally?

Ongoing Slacking, here anyway

Ok, its been a good run of timely weekly updates, but unfortunately actual work and other projects are catching up to me again, so I won't be able to maintain that or return to it for the foreseeable future.

Hopefully after this push to the summer, I 'll have more time, and there may be sporadic new posts until then, but for now, it looks like we're back to the "hiatus" part of the cycle with this thing.
Just letting you know, and hoping it gave you some things to think about while it lasted.

As always fee free to leave comments if you have questions, want to know more, or have your own thought about anything posted.

Pre-Halloween Slacking

This was gonna be brief, because I've been working on a Halloween costume, so haven't had much time for writing this week.

So I'm just gonna quickly direct you to what I found on Cracked friday, because ohmygods, everything in this article. I mean I know the point of the article is to plug their new book, which barely addresses the points raised in the article, but at least it has a good mindset.  Like, between pointing out the gaping flaws in the system, and the infuriation at making a process that should be wonderful, beautiful and empowering into a process that sucks the life out of students, its all kinds of good. Its so nice to see other people being riled up about  this kind of thing too, so I can't not share.

Anyway, I'll try to have something more substantial next week.

Have a Happy Halloween!

The ....Adventures of Walter Mitty?

Lets get literary for a this week (and a bit cinematic). Recently I saw the trailer for the new film adaptation of "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty" and want to talk about it. Now if you haven't heard of the original work, its a very prominent and influential short story about a unimpressive man doing errands for a nagging wife, but imagining himself as a dramatic hero in various ways. It was first published in 1939 and, perhaps closer to home, its clearly influenced things from Doug to Calvin and Hobbes to Scrubs.



Sort of the ur-escapist, daydreaming slacker.
(Pic is from the first movie version in 1947)

You can find the full text here (its only 2000 words, has aged well, and it'll only take a few minutes to read).

Actually I first heard of it years ago as a reference to Doug, which I was a big fan of growing up, when someone said he was "a young Walter Mitty" but I only finally read the actual Walter Mitty this year. I was impressed by how it very quickly and clearly painted the characters and Mitty's behavior, the transitions between fantasy and reality, and the variety of fantasies. Outside of the story though, its amazing how well it holds up today, and just how much its influenced things. In addition to the three listed, it has so many references (and feel free to point out more in comments)  and "mittyesque" is even in the dictionary.

Now why is that? What has this story touched on for years that still makes it relevant and relatable? This is an average guy, doing average things, feeling set upon by the world, but using fantasy to feel important, and even help with doing those mundane tasks (it does help him remember the puppy biscuits after all, even if he gets teased for it).

Importantly, he isn't the usual wish-fulfillment protagonist; its us wishing we were them.

That's a situation pretty much everyone has been in at some point, and arguably the mindset some people live in. Heck, I'd be remiss if I didn't point out more recent discussions of how much video games fall back on wish-fulfillment/power fantasies, for better or worse. I'm sure if were set today, Mitty could picture himself as a space marine.

I have no words.

So this is a really cool story from a themes and execution perspective. And actually its a great opportunity for a movie, because one of the tensions in making a movie is between having exciting, high stakes, over-the-top action, and having an intimate, small relatable human drama, right? Like one reason people said they liked the Avengers, was that you had big epic fights, but also small moments between characters. It tends to be hard to do both those things well, as many, many movies will tell you.



So allot focus on one or the other...

But Walter Mitty is tailormade for this. The whole point of the story is that he is an average guy dealing with mundane tasks, but in his mind hes doing big showy dramatic things that film loves, from air battles to court cases to doctoring (ok, maybe tv loves doctoring more than movies, but still).

This is a premise and hook designed  to let you tell a story of small, mundane triumphs and setbacks in a way that is big and showy and eyecatching: its easy-mode for making a drama accessible and pulling in people who don't normally care for them. Now, it is a short story, so you have to draw it out somehow, maybe a bit more plot and a bit more character development. But you have to be careful how you do it.

"Have you met us?"

Ok, so with all that  lead up, lets look at the trailer I saw. Lots of people are saying this is a great or stunning trailer and they're right. The visuals are amazing, and the current trend of telling almost the whole story of the movie in the trailer is in full force, showing his dull life, call to adventure, and shift from dreaming about the world to going out and living in it. And that is a compelling message and story.

But I think its a waste of potential.

Oh come on! We didn't give him a gun or anything!

Ok, yes, I'm sure it will be good, and the message is good and the way is plays up the wonder of nature and power to change yourself are great. One of the contenders for my favorite film is American Beauty, because I am really into stories about reflecting on your life and trying to be who you want to be, so I'm into that. And getting out of your head and out doing things is a good message, too. But not everyone can go climb the Himalayas...which makes me feel like Mitty shouldn't either. Not in real life.

Here's where I see the wasted potential: Walter Mitty's whole story, originally, is about him using fantasy to escape his kinda depressing life. He clearly wanted to be bigger and more important than being nagged by his wife, running errands, buying puppy biscuits, and generally looked down on. The movie, as shown in this trailer, is taking that as a staring point of his life, and making the story of him stopping dreaming a going out and living it. They even have allusions to him having been  an exciting photographer (or partnered with someone who became one), and now is in a boring spot (or choose to be boring while his buddy went out "to live life!").

Hollywood loves that kind of story, but they've done that story before and they could've done something much rarer here. They could've taken Mitty on a journey, but reduced the scale of his real life triumphs and setbacks, of what he turns around to something much more common and less remarkable, but still made it feel epic, and still kept him dreaming. Rather than sending the message that you should get out of your head and living life, which is not bad, but has been done before, you could have the message that fantasy is fine, but you can use those fantasies to actually be better. You, sitting there right now. There's even a kernel of this in the original story; like I said, it helps him remember the puppy biscuits. So what would it look like if we developed that to expand the story?



I know adding space battles is the obvious choice, but I'm going somewhere with this.

Ok, so new story: even if we leave out a job, and focus on home life, taking away some common dramatic stakes, and putting it squarely outside what action audiences generally care about, there is still so much you can do, and with humor and action and relatability. You can even start directly from the story, where they're going on errands, hes completely disengaged with his wife, and hes bored and made fun of. Even at that low point of his arc, with the fast paced action and shifting perspective, you can take that boring trip and  make it exciting and funny (particularly with the transitions). 

But from there you can go to a different end point; we're not aiming for Mitty not having dreams and going to the greatest places on Earth, where few can ever go, but  to him having them less, and using them to help him stay in engaged in his life, and be a better person in normal day-to-day life. We can even take the same regular errands form that first scene, and revisit it later, but redo the fantasies:

• Driving is an ambulance, rather than a plane, and hes trying to go fast while not harming the patient.
• The gloves prompt him to be a spy, readying himself while carefully driving past sentries and blending in, obeying the foreign signs to not give himself away.
• Again, the courtroom could actually be later in the same case from the court fantasy in the first scene, and again he could use it to remember something
• During his bored stretch we could either show him more engaged and less resigned, such as actually talking to people, maybe talking to people pretending to be a schmoozing millionaire at a fancy party, or if not being social, maybe hes a brilliant general planning movements while in real life planning his day or work for later. Or it could show a closer connection to his wife, painting him as lover about to be reunited.
• And this time when his wife forgets something he could've gotten it while he was waiting, and they go.

See, that way you can have a character doing mundane crap that people do everyday, (doing it twice even), and not only would it be engaging and exciting and entertaining both times, but it would even show character development and possibly be instructive. You'd of course want the real life people to react to Mitty differently too, to emphasize how hes changed; different body language responses, not making fun of him, his wife praising how better he is about little things, etc. But the point is you could take a very small scale story of personal improvement and make it a spectacle to draw in audiences; you can have the types of changes most people could actually make in their lives, and portray them in a very engaging way. In fact, portray them in the way they're used to getting all kinds of less helpful or realistic messages.



"You seem upset about something..."

Now, I'm not a film critic or literature buff, so why do I care so much about this adaptation?
Well, what I am is more of an educational designer, someone who tries to figure out how to make media or interactive systems that are fun and change the user for the better, through teaching skills or facts or mindsets. And that's why this adaptation  gets me: the version I outlined, contrasting the one they're going with, actually has  research to suggest just how helpful it can be in life.

Let me tell you about the Marshmallow Test.



Mmm, ok a film based on research almost lost me, but I'm back

The marshmallow test is a simple experiment that you may have heard of because it also produced some of the cutest videos of children to grace youtube. The way the original test works is this: you place a child in a room with a marshmallow on a plate. You tell them you're going to leave, and they can choose to eat the marshmallow, but if  they can wait until you come back without eating it, they can have 2 marshmallows. Those videos are adorable as you watch kids try everything they can to not eat that marshmallow.  But what exciting to a developmentalist is how performance on this test correlates to life success.

Bwah?

At its core, this is a task about delayed gratification; can you give up benefits now for greater benefits later.  Followups to the original marshmallow tests at Stanford found that kids who couldn't wait had lower SAT scores, higher BMI, more problems with drugs, and trouble paying attention. This makes perfect sense; If a kid has difficulty delaying gratification, or choosing long term benefits over short terms pleasure, you would expect them to have trouble doing unpleasant things (like studying) or inhibiting desires (like doing drugs). It also makes this a really exciting task to developmentalists, because its an early assessment of something that can impact so many areas over a person's life. (Which is why its also been covered by The New Yorker, Time, and Smithsonian). It even points to the importance of teaching children self control.

And that brings us back to Walter Mitty, because despite the state hes in in the short story, he might've been excellent at the marshmallow test. Let me explain: If you do versions of the test with different  time limits, or unending ones and see how long kids last, you can identify which kids are best at this task; which kids can really hold back and control themselves. You would think these kids have some kind of  "inner discipline" or "strong willpower" but when you ask them what kinds of strategies they used to not eat the marshmallow, to delay gratification, its appears something different is happening. You don't get things like "I tried really hard", you get responses like "I tried to pretend it wasn't there", "I told myself it was poison". What you get is kids using their imagination to make the task easier. Reframing the situation so its less demanding to delay gratification, to inhibit a response, to not eat the tasty, tasty marshmallow.

These kids are trying to use their imaginations, their fantasy worlds to help them achieve their real world goals. And research says the kids who are doing this, at least at this age, are fairing better later in life than those who aren't.

That is the kind of skill would be amazing to teach people, because of the potential benefits.
Conveying that kind of concept, in an engaging entertaining way, tends to be a monumental task.
But Walter Mitty, our man, seems tailormade for it.

He's just as surprised as you are.

And that's why it pains me to see him lumped in with all the "follow your dreams" stuff out there, rather than pioneering a new "use your dreams to achieve them" kind of message. Because when I say it seems like a waste, I'm not just saying I think this story and/or message would be more entertaining or unique take on the material; I'm saying I think there's a chance to try to make a piece of rich entertainment and artistry AND  maybe teach people something that could actually improve their lives.

And they're not doing that.

"What was that? I couldn't hear you over all this money and praise"

So what do you think:
Am I being too hard on Ben Stiller's new vehicle?
Is this message really needed or is there an even more interesting one I didn't think of?
Are you interested in hearing more about the marshmallow test?
Let me know your thoughts in the comments.

photo credit: Wikipedia, gratuitous space battles
(PS there is another marshmallow test, where teams of children tend to do better than teams of MBAs, so I hope I didn't confuse anyone, and maybe we can talk about that one another time)

I < 3 Valve

So last week I talked about the transition from identifying as a passive consumer, to a critical consumer or even creator of content, and specifically about communities supporting this shift; about how communities often improve themselves and those making this transition. Picking up from there, lets talk about what it looks like when company, a more formal, business oriented group directs its resources to encouraging that.

"Gentlemen, how do we help our customers? Yes, Johnson?"
"I don't understand sir."

If you want to see what it looks like for a company to value that transition (or something very close to it) you want to look at Valve. You know, the company behind Steam, the platform that does ~51% of the digital distribution of PC games (according to 2011 numbers)? Every time I watch a talk  by Gabe Newell, it makes me feel better about the company, its views,  and the directions its going.

Now, I said "something very close to it" earlier because Gabe is generally talking about content creation from more of an economic perspective, as a opposed to the sort cultural and intrapersonal perspectives the vlogbrothers and Jim Gee were coming from. While they talk about how it benefits someone to feel included and productive, and develop their ideas and abilities or how society benefits from more perspectives and new ideas, Gabe tends to talk about connecting creators to markets, or providing monetary incentives to become a creator to people who previously had none (for this type of work).

Its a different way of looking at the at the situation, but it makes perfect sense when you're talking from a business standpoint. It also shows why Valve is encouraging this type of capability growth; by setting itself up so it profits from market activity, its incentivized to help as many creators as possible reach as large a possible audience as possible. As opposed to the way most people think of a simplified model of a business where its incentivized to get as many people to give it as much money for its product.



"Ok, that part I understood"
"Johnson, stop being such a strawman and try to keep up."

So this sort of demonstrates how a system can be set up to where a company is monetarily encouraged to support these community effects that can be so positive, directly benefitting from them rather than it just being a nice bonus that marginally helps your specific game, product, or service.

The really interesting part of considering Valve though is considering how it got to this place and what its continued trajectory looks like, based on that past. Steam may have started as a way for Valve to distribute and verify its own games, but it grew into a convenient way to affordably buy games, lowering the barriers both in terms of availability and cost. Its one of the things Gabe talked about: connecting producers with markets they didn't have access to and making games easily widely available, regardless of what was physically available in your region.

And then there was the step of not just lowering barriers for consumers, but for creators;
making indie games more visible and available. Offering software to make games on Steam. Adding the workshop, so people can make and share pieces of games, and develop their skills.

Without even using training montages.

To the rage of Half-Life fans everywhere, now they seem more concerned with providing interesting tools and spaces for other people to make stuff than making stuff themselves. But the way they moved there from producing, and clearly have people who are still very focused on how to incentivize and influence behavior and who are interested in "creating markets" and enabling creators is what really makes them interesting to watch.

I said Gabe Newell makes me feel good about the company when he talks, but everytime they rollout something new picking apart its design and purpose is what really drives it home . If you don't think they want more creators, look at the workshop, and if you don't think they're still just as sharp on how to manipulate users, look at the trading cards and badges system. There's allot of amusing snark and/or ranting about companies doing one thing and saying another, but this post is about Valve because what they're doing and saying lines up, and what they're doing is very interesting compared to what most everyone else is doing.

Oh, another action/adventure/shooter game as a white male protagonist 
now with microtransactions? Cool, cool.
 Yeah we'll just be over here lowering barriers to entry
and enabling innovative new ideas at lower risk.

Of course if I'm going to talk about them now, I probably should address the Steam universe and Steam box. But its just continuing this trend, albeit very ambitiously. Putting steam in the living room opens up a larger audience to participate in playing games, and even contributing to them from there. But that's not the really ambitious part. Competing with consoles is kind of ambitious, creating an open platform, to enable the hardware competition and peripheral variety PCs have, is pretty ambitious, but again, not what I see as their biggest challenge.

If Valve is in the living room, with this track record, unless they screw it up first, they have to be eventually aiming to reduce barriers for other media: movies, tv, music, whatever. Eventually it'll be competing with (or working with) Youtube and Netflix and iTunes and whatever other media they can.

Yea, he shall be the lord of media distribution,
and this shall be his crown.

Now that much content under one banner is terrifying, for any group to have that much power over communications. But we have massive media empires right now, and I will be very interested to see, if Valve can get to that level, what it'll look like to have one with this creator focused, barrier breaking model driving it.



Ok, I may have gone off the rails at the end, but what do you think of Valve? Am I giving them too  much credit or vastly misreading they're direction? Can you think of are other companies that support a transition to a critical consumer or creator?
Let me know what you think in comments.

photo credit: ign