break the horizon.

By contrast to malicious game design which is built around... pranks at best and cruel jokes at worst, magical game design is built around magic tricks.

superceded by: MAGIC TRICKS, HORIZON BREAKS, ASTONISHMENT

"Designs that feature high player interaction[..]" have big storytelling and strategic value!

"They have amazing storytelling capacity."

"Digital games have a hard time with the free-for-all game with the exception of [the Battle Royale genre]. I think these are the most important games that have been developed since Minecraft [..] they are truly multi-lateral conflict games."

VIDEOGAMES

Alternate win cons are great if victory is the only thing keeping players in your game but if players are playing for other things, if those things are keeping them in the game, victory starts to become a little less important

Paths to victory

Liberte
High Frontier
^ "I once spent about an hour planning a mission to one of Jupiter's Moons and about halfway through I hit a radiation belt wrong and one of my spaceship components blew up and I spent the next hour, like hour of game-time, attempting to rescue my poor astronauts [..] and it was GREAT! The story that the game is telling is so bracing/powerful, you don't want to unplug" [even if you're not in the running for victory]

"Victory conditions"

"[they] bind the players together"

you can't tamper with them, you want to lay them out first. but what do you do when someone has no chance of winning?

"Diplomatic flexibility"

"There are no villains in real life. There are adversaries, and there are partners, and sometimes our partners become our adversaries. and sometimes we need to find partners in those who oppose us. No diplomacy system you're going to design is going to be as clever as your players."

"DANGEROUS GAME: Agree to play it, and also accept the danger"

"The game is the medium that allows players to interact with each other. [..] The game is the thing that puts them on the same page, but it doesn't necessarily have to be the thing that's keeping them there."

(Keeping them there?)

Quote from: Bernie De KovenWe are willing to play. We are each willing to play a particular game, we were willing to play with each other, and we arrived at the well-played game because of the way we combined with the game.

recommends Bernie's book The Well-Played Game (i think)