Two independent events collided to form the topic for this weeks's musings: my son's football season, which started today, and Starcraft's further delayed release.  Common thread? A philosophy of 'Go big, or go home.'  The phrase probably still works for football, but I think it has been usurped in games.  'Go small or go home' is what works in games today. As a result, I think we could be entering a new golden ages for games.

I am not saying big-budget console or PC titles don't dominate the landscape.  Money talks, and budgets of tens of millions of dollars can speak pretty loudly. But there are newer arenas, such as Big Fish Games, Armor Games, or the iPhone app store, where smaller teams can successfully distribute their efforts and garner an audience.  The result is an explosion of titles nearly unimaginable ten years ago, or twenty years ago when the game industry was in the midst of what many people now consider the golden age of game innovation and advancement. 

The results are predictably bell-curved; with thousands, perhaps tens of thousands of titles out there. A lot of it looks pretty familiar: platformers, tetris-clon es, tower-defense games, dungeon-crawls ... but even in these you can see evolution, nice touches or twists which make the games more enjoyable. There are outliers, such as This is the only level  on Armor games, which are enough of a twist to become different sort of game entirely. It won't take you long to find a game differerent enough to intrigue you. 

The Second Adventurer's vault came out this Tuesday, and the siren lure of loot calls to all my players. Published by Wizards of the Coast, the Adventurer's Vault is a catalog of item after item of magical treasure for DND characters.  By the game this Saturday, every one of my players will have a copy of the book.  No other DND supplement has such universal appeal.

Its been decades since I played DND in strict accordance with it most iconic stereotype: kick down the door, kill the monster, take the treasure. Now a session might be winning a poleball tournament at the Spring Festival in Evenmoon, finding out why vampire lords are stealing peoples' shadows, negoitating a treaty between the tribes of goblinkind and the city of Dukesport, or returning Baldur's Gate to the proper shard in the Forgotten Realms. The storyttelling is more varied, the narrative more expansive, often a sandbox style world inviting exploration. Much has changed. But that third part of the iconic stereotype? Players still want their treasure. 

Treasure is such an integral part of DND; always has been, always will be.   You could play a DND campaign without treasure, but it would not be recognizable to most players, and would be an acquired taste. Why does treasure hold such an important place in the hearts of players and the core design of the game?

Treasure has an important place in the stories of heroic fantasy.

Sometimes the treasure is the central focus of the heroes' quest, such as the golden fleece or Sauron's ring.  Other times it motivates protagonists such as Conan or Fafhrd and Gray Mouser.  A gem could be the MacGuffin in all kinds of stories, detective, romance, noir... make it a huge ruby and you are probably in heroic fantasy. So not only does treasure have an important place in the stories of heroic fantasy, but its often over-the-top, far-larger-than-life treasure.  If you need a 1-carat diamond engagement ring found, you are in a story for a TV detective. If you need the Eye of Fiery Morning, a ruby the size of your fist, stolen from the Temple of the Dawn Warriors, you are in a story for adventurers. DND caters to players who love those sorts of stories. 

The flip side of treasure is the guardian, or enemy coveting the treasure. Treasure is the reward and the justification for much conflict in heroic fantasy. It forms one leg of the conflict triangle; hero, monster, treasure.  The advantage to this structure is its simplicity and durability. You can run a successful DND campaign with nothing more than well-staged versions of that triangle. 

Treasure complements DND character class, and is a critical component of play.

From a design viewpoint, treasure complements the abilities and features of character classes in DND.  Take a look at the table below.

Here is what I mean by the table.

Character classes gain abilities every time they level up. You can plan and anticipate those advances. Treasure can suddenly appear, and some treasure can be a game-changer. Players often alter their plans or tactics when they find the right bits of treasure. The predictable nature of character class improvement is complemented by the disruptive nature of treasure. 

Character class improvements are permanent; only extraordinary events or circumstances can take them away. Treasure is transient; it can be consumed, stolen, replaced. Characters therefore have more flexibility, and risk, with advantages granted by treasure. 

Character class gains are not often transferable to another character; you cannot share encounter powers but you can certainly swap pieces of treasure with one another.  Bags of holding, magical ropes, rings, potions, and more ... all can be reallocated for maximum party benefit

Customization is how unique you can make your character.  How different does my 14th level warlock look from your 14th level warlock? Treasure again makes a critical difference here. 

Treasure is such a critical part of DND that is helps predict which genres or gaming styles the game engine could be used to play. If loot is not a feature of the genre or style of game, DND just won't feel right. If the story rewards which are part of the genre convention don't include loot, don't expect the game to run fluidly using DND.  Detective and investigation style-campaigns are infamously hard to run well in DND. One reason is that the typical rewards of such stories (unraveling a mystery to reveal the truth, see justice served) don't typically inlcude a glowing chest in the corner of the room. The conventions of such stories work against the treasure leg that helps support DND. Not that you cannot do it, but a DM has extra work cut out for her to make such a campaign successful. 

So bring on Adventurer's Vault 2, bring on the gleam of anticipation in the eyes of players. After all, this is DND. 

This midweek musing is the beginning of a two-parter, about trends I see in games. They are exemplified by two games; Plants vs. Zombies and Evony. Whether by happenstance or an ongoing battle for gamer meme space, a great parody ad recently appeared linking the two.  If you have seen Evony's ubiquitous ads on game sites, you know the basis for the ad.

This week I talk about Plants. vs. Zombies, next week Evony. 

I blame Plants vs. Zombies on my friend Francine. We share similar tastes in addictive games.  When she offered up Pop Caps newest confection I thought, "Hey, I haven't wasted nearly enough of my life lately. This should slow down all that nagging productivity."  I confidently set out to achieve this goal, which was quickly realized. 

Plants vs. Zombies has classic Pop Cap trappings; brightly colored, amusingly animated game content, simple interface, quick play. The music loop is pop-music style, as bright as the animation, with the ability to occupy brain space you might want for other things at a later date. Pop Cap games usually have rock-solid game play, and Plants. vs. Zombies follows that rule. 

What I find fascinating is that Plants. vs. Zombies is, at its heart, an RTS that has been streamlined down to a casual game. You are defending your home from waves of zombies.  Each level starts with a brief view of the types of zombies you can expect to assault you at some point.  Zombies attack a row, advancing until they reach your house, in which case the player loses the level. The player defends his home with plants he grows in the rows, to impede or destroy the advancing zombies. It has the classic RTS choices; how much effort to spend gathering resources, when to develop cheap versus expensive units, which units to create, and decision making against foes approaching in real time.

The basic resource gathered is sunlight; sunlight falls naturally, but you will need sunlight-generating plants to put up a decent defense. Every plant requires sunlight to plant. Some work immediately after being planted, others take a few seconds to mature.  The tech tree is represented by the plants you may use in each level, and defensive bonuses you can purchase from the back of a crazy man's car. The player unlocks the tech tree as he completes the levels.

I have talked to a few Plants. vs. Zombies players who really enjoy the game, but wouldn't think of touching Rise of Nations or Dawn of War, or the classic Starcraft. Part of the reluctance is theme; conquering the world or slaughtering orks doesn't sit well with the casual game crowd. But Pop Cap performed some game alchemy distilling the essence of an RTS into one that plays casually. They had to find what makes an RTS fun, and discard everything else which would turn off a casual games crowd.  Micromanagement? Almost non-existent. Map size? Tiny. Length of battles? Short. Research decisions? None. Impact player choice has on the outcome of a battle? Completely huge. Picking the right mix of plants for your defense, planting them at the right time in the right spots, and quickly patching holes when a wave isn't going your way, determines the outcome.  Plants vs. Zombies really is an RTS in miniature, colorfully packaged to appeal to casual gamers.  And the appeal is apparently strong.  

Blurring the delineation between hard-core games and casual games helps both. Casual games and hard-core games start to form a continuum, rather than being seen as distinct types.  I think this creates new gateways for genres of games; some casual players will move along the continuum to more hard-core titles of the genre's they love, and hard-core gamers of one genre may be more willing to experiment with new genres of games at the casual level. This is a development that excites me. I enjoy marble-popping games, but I am thrilled to see casual games take on classic game genres.  I hope to play many more in the near future.

X3: Terran Conflict is a good game in the space-faring genre of Elite or Freelancer. But if you are new to space games, the interface and complexity of the universe might be pretty daunting. Currently, I know of no casual title that could fill that gap in the way Plants vs. Zombies does for RTS games. My hunch is, that in the next ten years hard-core genres which can be distilled down to casual titles will have a bright future, and that the genre's that are irreducible will stagnate.  With the cost of game production rising, producers are going to be more and more reluctant to spend money on a gamer base that isn't growing. If you are a fan of RTS games, then you have a rooting interest in Plants. vs. Zombies.  If you a fan of other genres, you should be cheering for casual game versions of those genres, even if you think you have outgrown them.

As always, your comments are welcome. 

See you next week. 

Two days ago my son returned from a vacation; he, his mom and her husband had gone to China.  He has a frame of reference similar to those of many American teenagers. What stood out for him could well differ from what a typical tourist might take in.  According to his reports, while there may have been centuries of history on display, including a dang impressive wall, the truly impressive take-aways from China were:

1) Real Chinese cuisine is far too healthy for an American teenager to eat without going crazy. 

2) Matching a stereotype of an American teenager from the 1950's, tall, blond, blue-eyes, will get your picture taken a lot. Mostly by Chinese teenagers. 

3) Photography will be accompanied by questions; most questions will about the clothes you are wearing that day. 

Given that half of Spencer's shirts are products of one of his football camps or teams, there was a considerable deal of confusion in the lack of context. The questioner would ask about the shirt, leading to an exchange like the following: 

"That is a sport shirt?"

"Yes, its a football shirt." 

"What is player doing with the ball?" 

"Carrying it. Its American Football." 

"Yes! Yes! Like LA Galaxy?" 

"Um... no... like Pittburgh Steelers. New England Patriots. Dallas Cowboys?" 

"Ah. Then what is the player doing with the ball?" 

"Running with it.' 

"He should be kicking it?"

My guess is that the shock of discovering just how parochial and obscure a sport American football is on the world stage left my son ill-prepared to try to explain it. So one chance to introduce curious Chinese to the king of American sports was lost.

Some clothing prompted better dialogue: his Warcraft shirts.  World of Warcraft is well known in China; Spencer just had the interesting fortune to be there during the tail-end of a World of Warcraft drought, where 5 million players were cut off from the game they love.  This link from the China Daily has the meat of the story.  Nutshell version, Blizzard moved from server service NetEase to The9; Chinese government did not approve the move, leaving the Chinese without WOW since early June.  An accord has been reached, assuming Blizzard can remove 'excessive violence' from the game,  so some fashion of WOW is expected to be available to the Chinese by the end of this month. 

On this topic, American teenager and Chinese teenagers seemed to be in perfect harmony; you have got to get your game on.  Can't update Facebook from China because of government restrictions? Vaguely interesting.  Can't play your favorite game because a ministry has not given its approval? Now you are talking legitimate grievance. My son, jonesing for his own computer at home, completely empathized with his Chinese counterparts. Their experiences, literally half-a-world apart, were separate but shared.

Before my son left on the trip, I was pretty excited about the prospect of his exposure to Chinese culture and history. The trip would shake him up a little, give him a chance to see the world in a different light. When that light turned out to be the glow of billions of pixels on millions of monitors, my parental hopes and expectations rapidly deflated. I sighed, and folded them up to toss them in the closet to keep the other lost expectations company. If you are a parent, you understand that sometimes that's just part of the gig.  

Then that piece of me that fires up for every project I  work on, the passionate piece that cares about games, often cares more than is reasonable ... that part started having a field day. My son had traveled to China, met perfect strangers, and connected with them. The bond? A game. Totally flipping awesome; a game that bridged cultures, how freaking cool is that? That the game in question descends from RPGs? Beautiful, just absolutely perfect. 

But if his mom asks what I am giggling about, I will tell her it is something you said. So back me up on that, okay?

Thanks.