Thoughts of a Flying Sheep

Sly and the Great Tree

Sly Cooper is what I wanted Thief (Looking Glass Studios) to be. Direct combat is possible, but not very effective. The game encourages you to be sneaky without restricting you to only being sneaky.

The Great Tree

I can tell when a game is really good when I need to set a limit (ahead of time) on how long I will play that game. For a number of Reflexive game demos, this limit is built in (60 minutes, or for some generous games, 2 hours*).

• For bad games, I don't even get to the 60 minute mark before putting the game aside, writing a quick review, and being done with it.
• For mediocre games, I'll play until the 60 minutes are up, and then say, "Well, I've wasted enough of my life on that game.
• For good games, I'll go through the entire 60 minutes in a single setting. Then, exhausted, I'll think, "Boy, that was fun, I should buy that game for more."

Certain games, like Star Defender 4 and The Great Tree, are so good that that fall out of this scale.

• For excellent games, I carefully dole out the fun in measured quantities. I'll just play through this set of levels, or play until I lose all of my ships. The disappointment when I stop playing is actually outweighed by my anticipation of playing again.

This may be some new take on the "just one more turn" type of games. With a time limit in place, there's a sort of artificial value inflation (when a resource is limited, it becomes more valuable). How does one create a game where the anticipation of playing is as good, or possibly better than the playing itself?

* Two hours is really too much. You're taking a risk that the player will get bored of the game in that much time

posted by FlyingSheep @ 8:18 PM