9 ms·

The real lesson is that the game media/medium does not lend itself to linear stories inherited from TV, that inherited from film, that inherited from theater.

by bullen 3y ago

The real lesson is that the game media/medium does not lend itself to linear stories inherited from TV, that inherited from film, that inherited from theater. Games should only be multiplayer. Real-time action multiplayer. And they should NEVER have cutscenes. They also can't have music (except live) because 3D sound is paramount. And they should be open-source or source-available so we can improve and modify them. Habitat said all that and I think the article didn't but... you know... down votes without comment incoming!

epolanski 3y ago
That's your personal take. I too believe gaming should be more about humans interacting, but there's millions of people out there that disagree and value the story of games.
- bullen 3y ago
  People expect comments to not be a personal take? Linear things destroy your mind, because you become a passive consumer. Producing is the only meaningful purpose in existence, but not for someone else, for yourself. Now it's too late, people are used to sitting on their ass and be entertained and pay for that by "working" for an "owner". Down votes without comment! Get off that couch and into a chair with a keyboard and mouse, then download a compiler and get cracking! It's not hard once you figure out that only Windows and linux can do it. And only linux on Risc-V is meaningful in the long term. We only explored 10% of the action MMO so far, PUBG has been the limit with it's janky controls and buggy/slow performance. Imagine a 1000 player 3D Mario, it's totally doable. Just do it!
  - bowsamic 3y ago
    Are we playing a game of “who has the most outrageous life philosophy”?
    - bisq 3y ago
      Don't feed the trolls.
  - njharman 3y ago
    > People expect comments to not be a personal take? Some comments are factual; corrections, links, additional information, etc. But people do expect HN to be polite, and "that's your personal take" is the polite way to say "you're a loony ideologue who sees everything through bi-color (BW) lens".
  - pastage 3y ago
    I did work on that in 99-01, so much has happened since then. Have you done anything else than protocols? We failed spectacularly. Massive Multiplayer is hard to do research on, you can not whip something up and have 20k players evaluate it for you. Just getting 10 people to consistently test something is hard. I guess we could work on improving the MP of generic games like Minecraft/Minetest and skip the game logic.
  - epolanski 3y ago
    > People expect comments to not be a personal take? Well, I think the phrasing does a lot. Your post sounds like you deal in absolutes rather than exposing an opinion.
egypturnash 3y ago
Ironically Habitat's design owed a lot to Maniac Mansion, which is literally the game that coined the term "cutscene". https://web.archive.org/web/20070415021118/http://grumpygamer.com/8139425 https://web.archive.org/web/20070415021118/http://grumpygame...
- cdchn 3y ago
  I think Habitat predated Maniac Mansion.
- FRandallFarmer 3y ago
  Though they may look similar, overlapped in developement, shared key staff and infrastructural pieces, Maniac Mansion and Habitat had very different renderers and user interfaces. MM used sprites for animating characters (severely limiting the number in a location at once) and it used characterset remapping for scrolling backgrounds and magic slipping maps to provide a sense of depth. Habitat was a 2.5d renderer where every forground object was seperately rendered each frame and every background object was rendered each state-change. Any objects could be in front/behind any other objects at any time. Sprites in Habitat were used only for UI elements: The speach-bubble "quip" and the proto-pie-menu/cursor for commands.
  - egypturnash 3y ago
    Huh, I always figured they shared a lot more underlying tech based on the images I've seen! Especially given that I remember hearing the maximum number of avatars in a single location was eight. My entire experience with it was like a half an hour looking over the shoulder of someone logged into Club Caribe and various magazine articles, though.
cdchn 3y ago
You should give "Space Station 13" a try.
- bullen 3y ago
  Round-based? What part of real-time action is that?
  - cdchn 3y ago
    It is real time. I think you're confusing "round based" for "turn based."
    - bullen 3y ago
      Looking at it now I can tell you this is not what I mean by real-time action. So communication is hard because humans have a tendency to warp things. "1000 player 3D Mario" should paint the picture in your head. I mean action with animation and physics movement. It doesn't necessarily have to be realistic, but it needs acceleration, sustain, decay and momentum. Also needs friction and collision. This game is not a video game... it's a networked cardboard game. No way you can get presence in there without youth levels of imagination or chemicals involved.
      - cdchn 3y ago
        This game has modeled atmospherics, I think you underestimate how much simulation is done there and also how good people's imaginations are.

by bullen 3y ago

epolanski 3y ago

That's your personal take. I too believe gaming should be more about humans interacting, but there's millions of people out there that disagree and value the story of games.

bullen 3y ago
People expect comments to not be a personal take? Linear things destroy your mind, because you become a passive consumer. Producing is the only meaningful purpose in existence, but not for someone else, for yourself. Now it's too late, people are used to sitting on their ass and be entertained and pay for that by "working" for an "owner". Down votes without comment! Get off that couch and into a chair with a keyboard and mouse, then download a compiler and get cracking! It's not hard once you figure out that only Windows and linux can do it. And only linux on Risc-V is meaningful in the long term. We only explored 10% of the action MMO so far, PUBG has been the limit with it's janky controls and buggy/slow performance. Imagine a 1000 player 3D Mario, it's totally doable. Just do it!
- bowsamic 3y ago
  Are we playing a game of “who has the most outrageous life philosophy”?
  - bisq 3y ago
    Don't feed the trolls.
- njharman 3y ago
  > People expect comments to not be a personal take? Some comments are factual; corrections, links, additional information, etc. But people do expect HN to be polite, and "that's your personal take" is the polite way to say "you're a loony ideologue who sees everything through bi-color (BW) lens".
- pastage 3y ago
  I did work on that in 99-01, so much has happened since then. Have you done anything else than protocols? We failed spectacularly. Massive Multiplayer is hard to do research on, you can not whip something up and have 20k players evaluate it for you. Just getting 10 people to consistently test something is hard. I guess we could work on improving the MP of generic games like Minecraft/Minetest and skip the game logic.
- epolanski 3y ago
  > People expect comments to not be a personal take? Well, I think the phrasing does a lot. Your post sounds like you deal in absolutes rather than exposing an opinion.

egypturnash 3y ago

Ironically Habitat's design owed a lot to Maniac Mansion, which is literally the game that coined the term "cutscene". https://web.archive.org/web/20070415021118/http://grumpygamer.com/8139425 https://web.archive.org/web/20070415021118/http://grumpygame...

cdchn 3y ago
I think Habitat predated Maniac Mansion.
FRandallFarmer 3y ago
Though they may look similar, overlapped in developement, shared key staff and infrastructural pieces, Maniac Mansion and Habitat had very different renderers and user interfaces. MM used sprites for animating characters (severely limiting the number in a location at once) and it used characterset remapping for scrolling backgrounds and magic slipping maps to provide a sense of depth. Habitat was a 2.5d renderer where every forground object was seperately rendered each frame and every background object was rendered each state-change. Any objects could be in front/behind any other objects at any time. Sprites in Habitat were used only for UI elements: The speach-bubble "quip" and the proto-pie-menu/cursor for commands.
- egypturnash 3y ago
  Huh, I always figured they shared a lot more underlying tech based on the images I've seen! Especially given that I remember hearing the maximum number of avatars in a single location was eight. My entire experience with it was like a half an hour looking over the shoulder of someone logged into Club Caribe and various magazine articles, though.

cdchn 3y ago

You should give "Space Station 13" a try.

bullen 3y ago
Round-based? What part of real-time action is that?
- cdchn 3y ago
  It is real time. I think you're confusing "round based" for "turn based."
  - bullen 3y ago
    Looking at it now I can tell you this is not what I mean by real-time action. So communication is hard because humans have a tendency to warp things. "1000 player 3D Mario" should paint the picture in your head. I mean action with animation and physics movement. It doesn't necessarily have to be realistic, but it needs acceleration, sustain, decay and momentum. Also needs friction and collision. This game is not a video game... it's a networked cardboard game. No way you can get presence in there without youth levels of imagination or chemicals involved.
    - cdchn 3y ago
      This game has modeled atmospherics, I think you underestimate how much simulation is done there and also how good people's imaginations are.