I frequently have game-related things I want to post about here (and
writing-related things, and science fiction-related things, and...),
but rarely feel like I have the time to post thoughtfully, so this is
an experiment in writing something off the top of my head just as it
occurs to me.
The concept of "user-generated content" has been a
buzz-word for a good long while, and it can be perceived perhaps as
just that, or maybe it's something more significant, our inevitable yet
exciting slide toward Hamlet on the Holodeck
(and the "holodeck" is something that comes up often in any online
world discussion)... because of the convenience of the business buzz
term (UGC), we're now beginning to accept in a major way that as we
make advances into online space, one of the deepest drives that we have
as people is to create, to shape that space for ourselves and not
"merely" inhabit it.
But no one's managed to create a truly workable, accessible UCG-friendly area yet. Second Life isn't it. Metaplace isn't it (sorry Raph). Thus far, properties that have made UGC their core mission have not been successful.
Maybe it's technological limitations, the idea whose time is still not come. Maybe it's what Will Wright says about The Sims and Spore -- that people don't really want to create, they want the illusion of creating -- the illusion of the creative act in the same way Guitar Hero is the illusion and not the reality of musicality.
But
I think there's something else to it, and I also don't mean to diminish
the deep difficulty in creating a user-modifiable space with accessible
tools -- if it were easy, someone would have done it. The secret sauce
balance between UGC and sticky gameplay -- the core broad inspiration
that hooks a player and makes them feel compelled to create in this space -- hasn't yet been found, though perhaps The Sims has come closest.
Again,
though -- something else to it. I suspect that game developers are
uniquely inhibited in creating user-friendly user-generated-content...
generators. We're so used to forcing a system to do what we want no
matter the barrier that it becomes very difficult to squeeze our brains
into the experience of, perhaps, the one thing we can't envision -- a
person who doesn't have that immediate burning desire to bend a
completely unreasonable tool to their will. And so we wind up creating
only slightly less unreasonable tools rather than tools that are
actually inviting and intuitive.
This is actually something that
I love about designing games for kids. Kids will not give you a single
inch. If you do something stupid, you don't get away with it -- they
don't stick around to see if you fix yourself. They tell you that
you're being stupid and they walk away. This applies in fundamental
game design, in UI design, in art and in concept -- in every dimension.
It is a phenomenally educational experience for a designer, to make
something for a kid you don't know, who has no reason to cut you any
slack.
And it's also why we can learn from the web, why we need
to reach out to marketing-minded folk and usability experts, because
product marketing has learned an awful lot about how to track user
behavior and dropoff rates, and what stems the tide. It has been
abundantly clear for some time now that the future of online games is
not in trapping a consumer through flashy advertising into traveling to
a store and buying an expensive box -- it's in online lowest-barrier
access.
And that means we don't have them shackled into stubbornly
enjoying our product the way we do if they've already purchased a
retail box -- we have thirty seconds to five minutes (in the
excessively patient) to differentiate ourselves significantly enough
from our competition to keep them clicking. They need a reason
in the first gut-check five seconds. Our hooks need to be better. Our
content needs to be better. We need to stop thinking we can be sadistic
and get away with it, that we can make the game entry process some sort
of esoteric and bizarre hazing rather than a welcoming overture that
compels and inspires.
So that's your fast post. Have a great weekend, all!