4 ms·

I never understood the appeal of having game knowledge on a separate websites. I can understand this situation happening because of lack of development resourc

I never understood the appeal of having game knowledge on a separate websites. I can understand this situation happening because of lack of development resources. Like - yeah, it's easier to just let the community to write the documentation and concentrate on the game, if you're small company. But why would it appeal to the actual players? It's not really secret knowledge, there are wiki websites with all the recipes.

Auracle 2y ago
You know, for younger kids I can see the appeal. They might not have a device they can easily use to go on the internet, so you’d be able to do things your friends can’t and vice versa. I’ve long mulled on the idea of some kind of game where large aspects of it are randomized/generated so that no two installations would have the same stuff, recipes, whatever. I think that’d be neat and get rid of the website issue.
- jbmny 2y ago
  Reminds me of the fatalities in Mortal Kombat growing up. All the regular moves were in the manual, but IIRC the fatalities were not. It was a form of secret knowledge, and it was really cool if you knew one. Granted, this was right before the Internet-connected home computer became ubiquitous.
  - Kye 2y ago
    GameFAQs very quickly democratized game knowledge the way Wikipedia did for general knowledge a handful of years later. I learned the infinite 1up stair trick in Mario[0] from a sibling before that, but had the most fun with stuff I could look up. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rQCSEcyGQH4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rQCSEcyGQH4
- iamwil 2y ago
  Those are rouge-likes. They still have wikis. See Spleunky and Hades.
  - squeaky-clean 2y ago
    I've had the same idea as them, they mean something beyond a rogue like. Like here Hades has a wiki list of all "Keepsake" items and their bonuses and abilities [0]. So you can always know the Old Spiked Collar always gives 25/38/50 HP bonus. What if instead of 25 at the first tier, it was a random range from 15-35. What if there was a chance it gave a damage boost instead? Or resistance against physical damage. Or it gave lightning a 30% bonus, or.... Basically everything shuffled and procedurally generated to the degree that 2 players discussing the game would barely have an overlapping experience aside from the general genre being the same. It would be really hard to make it so every playthrough has some semblance of balance though, and for things to narratively make sense, e.g. Iron items should always be stronger than copper items etc. [0] https://hades.fandom.com/wiki/Keepsakes#List_of_keepsakes https://hades.fandom.com/wiki/Keepsakes#List_of_keepsakes
    - rcxdude 2y ago
      Roguelikes still often have a mechanic like you describe: nethack, for example, randomises the descriptions of items, and that can affect how the game plays (because, for example, what material a ring or a wand is made of can affect how it reacts to effects). It's not quite as significant as you are suggesting, but you will find that it is still heavily documented in the game's wiki.
    - tialaramex 2y ago
      If the game is significantly interesting to a sizeable population they will unwind any amount of complexity and randomness. If you think about it, that's what happened to our actual world. If it's a "random range from 15-35" that's what the Wiki will say. Worse, if you've coded this slightly wrong and it's actually 15, 18, or 20 to 35 with no chance of 16 or 19, that will be on the Wiki. If you have much better shot at 30+ if you were holding the "jump" button as you picked the collar, that too finds its way to the Wiki if there are enough players. The exact same thing which drives humans to find out how the hell it's possible for some atoms of the same element to be heavier than others (more neutrons) will also drive players of a very popular game to figure out the fine details of how it works. Don't add balance by the way. In single player games it's probably futile (players will break it anyway) and you may destroy the fun elements in the game in a quest to "balance" it properly, like taking a delicious tart and turning it into mush fit for a baby. Even in a multi-player game, prefer to make everybody unbalanced rather than trying to homogenize them. If rock smashes scissors, but paper wraps rock, and scissors cut paper we've got a game, it's not a very good game, but it's at least a game.
throwuxiytayq 2y ago
It's bad design and it was annoying already back when Minecraft was still young. The article author gets this hilariously wrong. He claims that he is "obsessed" with Minecraft, but later admits that they haven't played the game much. I knew that before I even got to that paragraph...
- bluefirebrand 2y ago
  I think maybe the author means they are obsessed with something about Minecraft, the success story, the cultural impact, something like that. Not necessarily obsessed with playing it
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
fbdab103 2y ago
Especially when the goto gaming wiki site host is straight-up internet cancer.
- jcotton42 2y ago
  https://minecraft.wiki/ https://minecraft.wiki/ replaced the fandom wiki some time ago.
itronitron 2y ago
The appeal of having it on a wiki is that you can browse to related items and topics that can inform how you play the game. Serendipitous discovery of information, something the internet used to enable.
Medox 2y ago
How else would you find the knowledge if not through separate websites, when using the Web Displays Mod [1] in game? /s [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bK-m2dH4LEw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bK-m2dH4LEw
hluska 2y ago
I like it because you don’t have to consult those resources. If you like, you can figure out the game completely as you go.
exitb 2y ago
You know how Nintendo released Pokémon Red and Blue? The final goal of the game was to catch all the Pokémon, but depending on which version you’ve bought, some of them were missing. The only way to actually collect all was to trade with other players, which created a community around the game. Similarly with Minecraft, an online community got built around these wikis, figuring out stuff much beyond simple crafting recipes. We’d never get the cart boosters, water elevator or optimal mining techniques if everyone just played off the tutorial.

Auracle 2y ago

You know, for younger kids I can see the appeal. They might not have a device they can easily use to go on the internet, so you’d be able to do things your friends can’t and vice versa. I’ve long mulled on the idea of some kind of game where large aspects of it are randomized/generated so that no two installations would have the same stuff, recipes, whatever. I think that’d be neat and get rid of the website issue.

jbmny 2y ago
Reminds me of the fatalities in Mortal Kombat growing up. All the regular moves were in the manual, but IIRC the fatalities were not. It was a form of secret knowledge, and it was really cool if you knew one. Granted, this was right before the Internet-connected home computer became ubiquitous.
- Kye 2y ago
  GameFAQs very quickly democratized game knowledge the way Wikipedia did for general knowledge a handful of years later. I learned the infinite 1up stair trick in Mario[0] from a sibling before that, but had the most fun with stuff I could look up. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rQCSEcyGQH4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rQCSEcyGQH4
iamwil 2y ago
Those are rouge-likes. They still have wikis. See Spleunky and Hades.
- squeaky-clean 2y ago
  I've had the same idea as them, they mean something beyond a rogue like. Like here Hades has a wiki list of all "Keepsake" items and their bonuses and abilities [0]. So you can always know the Old Spiked Collar always gives 25/38/50 HP bonus. What if instead of 25 at the first tier, it was a random range from 15-35. What if there was a chance it gave a damage boost instead? Or resistance against physical damage. Or it gave lightning a 30% bonus, or.... Basically everything shuffled and procedurally generated to the degree that 2 players discussing the game would barely have an overlapping experience aside from the general genre being the same. It would be really hard to make it so every playthrough has some semblance of balance though, and for things to narratively make sense, e.g. Iron items should always be stronger than copper items etc. [0] https://hades.fandom.com/wiki/Keepsakes#List_of_keepsakes https://hades.fandom.com/wiki/Keepsakes#List_of_keepsakes
  - rcxdude 2y ago
    Roguelikes still often have a mechanic like you describe: nethack, for example, randomises the descriptions of items, and that can affect how the game plays (because, for example, what material a ring or a wand is made of can affect how it reacts to effects). It's not quite as significant as you are suggesting, but you will find that it is still heavily documented in the game's wiki.
  - tialaramex 2y ago
    If the game is significantly interesting to a sizeable population they will unwind any amount of complexity and randomness. If you think about it, that's what happened to our actual world. If it's a "random range from 15-35" that's what the Wiki will say. Worse, if you've coded this slightly wrong and it's actually 15, 18, or 20 to 35 with no chance of 16 or 19, that will be on the Wiki. If you have much better shot at 30+ if you were holding the "jump" button as you picked the collar, that too finds its way to the Wiki if there are enough players. The exact same thing which drives humans to find out how the hell it's possible for some atoms of the same element to be heavier than others (more neutrons) will also drive players of a very popular game to figure out the fine details of how it works. Don't add balance by the way. In single player games it's probably futile (players will break it anyway) and you may destroy the fun elements in the game in a quest to "balance" it properly, like taking a delicious tart and turning it into mush fit for a baby. Even in a multi-player game, prefer to make everybody unbalanced rather than trying to homogenize them. If rock smashes scissors, but paper wraps rock, and scissors cut paper we've got a game, it's not a very good game, but it's at least a game.

throwuxiytayq 2y ago

It's bad design and it was annoying already back when Minecraft was still young. The article author gets this hilariously wrong. He claims that he is "obsessed" with Minecraft, but later admits that they haven't played the game much. I knew that before I even got to that paragraph...

bluefirebrand 2y ago
I think maybe the author means they are obsessed with something about Minecraft, the success story, the cultural impact, something like that. Not necessarily obsessed with playing it
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

fbdab103 2y ago

Especially when the goto gaming wiki site host is straight-up internet cancer.

jcotton42 2y ago
https://minecraft.wiki/ https://minecraft.wiki/ replaced the fandom wiki some time ago.

itronitron 2y ago

The appeal of having it on a wiki is that you can browse to related items and topics that can inform how you play the game. Serendipitous discovery of information, something the internet used to enable.

Medox 2y ago

How else would you find the knowledge if not through separate websites, when using the Web Displays Mod [1] in game? /s [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bK-m2dH4LEw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bK-m2dH4LEw

hluska 2y ago

I like it because you don’t have to consult those resources. If you like, you can figure out the game completely as you go.

exitb 2y ago

You know how Nintendo released Pokémon Red and Blue? The final goal of the game was to catch all the Pokémon, but depending on which version you’ve bought, some of them were missing. The only way to actually collect all was to trade with other players, which created a community around the game. Similarly with Minecraft, an online community got built around these wikis, figuring out stuff much beyond simple crafting recipes. We’d never get the cart boosters, water elevator or optimal mining techniques if everyone just played off the tutorial.