RJ Layton

Hey RJ. This is awesome. My question is are these supposed to be four separate ideas and if so it seems like ALL of them could actually be combined into a single game - eventually. FANTASY being the backdrop - death in fantasy becoming meaningful if the player is invested (which we are all invested in our fantasies) - political messages can come through in the backstory (i.e. Animal Farm) and romantic love...I'm all for that in video games. I think that love as a motivating factor is not utlized as much as it should be. The strength of Romeo and Juliet as a story for both sexes is hard to deny.

Thanks, Maya! I appreciate the comments.

Yes, a lot of my thinking has been revolving around what have become "central themes" for me. I do feel all of these questions could be handled in one game, and I'm sort of heading in that direction. I do want to narrow it down a bit but I suppose that will come in time.

I love the idea of meaningful game death. The challenge, I think, will come in balancing making death something you truly want to avoid and making it so harsh that you just stop playing the game. A lot has been done in trying to make NPC death more meaningful...it would be lovely to see avatar death become important as well.

Seems to me that "meaningful death" need not be synonymous with "harsher penalties for death". It could simply be something that changes the game, thereby rendering it an important event.

I've heard it said (though never verified) that if you die a certain number of times in the dungeons in original Legend of Zelda, the enemy behavior changes. True or not, that's a meaningful consequence of death. I've always thought it would be interesting to do something along these lines: give people a situation where "death" is different than "reset", and has a tangible effect on the world. Hopefully something more profound than a skeleton throwing or not throwing bones in a dungeon, but hey, you need to start somewhere.

Interesting Jamie, I'd never heard that about Zelda before. Even if it's not true, it's an interesting idea. Changing the world... that will definitely happen :)

Diana, I agree that it's a big problem. I feel like I might have a grasp on what to do, but it involves playing games in such a different way that I'm not sure how players will react. It's exciting but worrying at the same time.

I have a lot to mention on this subject so I should really just get around to making a post about it.