So I bought some indie games - Page 3

On July 17 2013 04:14 0x64 wrote:
You got provoked because I freely gave a quite bold statement, which the important part was the if thedeadhaji like Binding of Isaac, he will totally love Don't Starve.

Both game are permadeath games. Both have twisted humor. Both have a dark esthetic. Both have an awesome original soundtrack.

Sure they are from different genre and might be that thedeadhaji hates minecraft from the bottom of his heart and I am very wrong.

When I play a roguelike and I get very little joy from loot, I feel cheated. There are antipatterns used on purpose in the design of the game and I don't buy in that. I really love the guys that made it, I know they master many aspect of game design, and they actually told this was not something they'd expect to be a success, yet it was and the reason for that comes from two big things, 1. They have a cult status in the indie community, 2. The great things I listed in my list of similarities with Dont Starve.

On July 17 2013 16:04 Tobberoth wrote:

I fail to see the problems in game design, and I've studied it myself. Feel free to enlighten me on these anti-patterns. The fact that you get very little joy from loot in The Binding of Isaac must be a problem on your end, I get very happy when I get good loot like quadshot, book of belial etc. I mean sure, some of the drops are quite mediocre, but then again, that's true for all roguelikes... like when you find a nice axe, equip it, and realize it has slightly worse damage than your previous weapon, and is cursed.

Personally, I find Don't Starve way weaker from a game-design point of view since the game doesn't really have much of a goal, it's more of a chore. "Find wood, click click, find wood, click click".

Safe to say, your reasons for why the game is popular is wrong. There's no way Northernlion would have over 560 Binding Of Isaac videos on his YouTube if he only played it for the aesthetics and the developers.

On July 17 2013 22:00 0x64 wrote:


Look, this discussion is going nowhere.
Anti-patterns you can find in binding of Isaac or combination of pattern that may raise conflict in the design.
Randomness is conflicting with game mastery.
The random generation creates Illusionary Rewards.
Imperfect information modulates predictable consequences. This will create a gain knowledge pattern but without the strategic consequences.
It all result in the lack of meaningful choices. You have to play some leap of faith, build a knowledge of the distribution of positive/negative consequences for actions. Do you go through the teeth door? What influences your decision on that case?
There are plenty more, but I don't have all the evening to go though this.

The issue I have when arguing with fanatics of a game genre is that in the end, I wont get any argumentation back. "Oh this guy made 500 video on YouTube, your argument is wrong", this all in the end make it sound like I don't like the game, when I actually love it. Some critical thinking is the first aspect of a good game designer, if you are unable to find flaws in the design, you are biased.

On July 17 2013 23:55 Tobberoth wrote:

Northernlion having tons of videos of the game is a great argument. He aren't going to keep playing a game in that amount if your reason for liking it stems from the art direction and the name of the developer, and you're sure as hell not going to pull the number of viewers he has if that's the case. You wouldn't have www.boilr.com, competitive racing of the game, if people played it because of art direction and the status of the developers. All of this is based on deep gameplay, a game which is rewarding to play over and over and improve at.

Randomness does indeed conflict with game mastery, which is why Binding of Isaac is so different from the majority of Roguelikes, because the game has such a huge skill component. In a standard roguelike, there's a big chance that pure RNG will decide if you beat the game or not, Binding of Isaac lets you compensate with skill, so the randomness makes the game varied instead of becoming prohibitive. Randomness is part of all games to some degree (except chess obviously), the question is all about how much it prohibits the player.

I don't see how the random generation produces illusionary rewards, when you kill a boss you get a reward, when you get to an item room, you get a reward. Sure, how good the loot turns out to be is decided by randomness, but you always get a positive reward. The point of roguelikes isn't to reward you with loot anyway in the sense that many other games do, the reward of roguelikes is to get farther and unlock new parts of the game.

I agree that the amount of meaningful choice is limited and you have to go by knowledge of statistical outcomes, but there's no lack of it because it's known that certain choices affect the RNG.. for example, entering shops often raises the probability of Greed, entering devil room lowers the probability of angel rooms... getting devil room items is also a meaningful choice since it's a question of risk reward, do you pay with health to get better damage, etc.

I don't really care if you like the game or not, that's not what I'm arguing. I'm arguing your perspective on the game design and why it's popular because your arguments are downright wrong. I wouldn't have even commented on it if you wrote from the get go that you personally find Don't Starve a more enjoyable indie game, but using your incorrect views on why the game is popular to justify your comment begs the argument.

In a standard roguelike, there's a big chance that pure RNG will decide if you beat the game or not

On July 15 2013 18:42 thedeadhaji wrote:
I don't even have StarCraft 2!