EvaUnit02 on 28/10/2009 at 14:28
Does the following game design concept have a specific name?
* What we experience in Stalker's A-Life and what we were supposed to see in Bioshock before the focus testing - A.I. ecologies that happen regardless of player involvement.
* Random, unscripted stuff can potentially occur that has nothing to do with the player.
* The game doesn't make the player seem like the centre of the universe, they're just one of many (keep in mind that I'm talking solely in the context of Single Player titles).
Some open world and/or sandbox titles have used the aforementioned idea, AFAIK.
Thanks in advance.
demagogue on 28/10/2009 at 14:38
This might have a specific name in gaming, but the concept is older than games and (one version) has a specific technical name in philosophy and literature, "thrownness."
The idea is that you experience the world as being "thrown" into it (or it is being "thrown" at you), without any special connection ... it's there before you, it will be there after you.
Melan on 28/10/2009 at 14:45
In roleplaying games, the concept is referred to as 'sandbox gaming'. I am not sure if this is original to P&P games or if it was borrowed from computer stuff, however.
Sulphur on 28/10/2009 at 16:36
I can't say if there's a better term than what demagogue posted. But I find it intriguing that there's a common emergent or pseudo-emergent gameplay aspect related to games of this sort.
Emergent behaviour doesn't necessarily need player input for it to occur - i.e., AI scripts/behaviours that interact with each other independent of what a player chooses to do in a game.
Jason Moyer on 28/10/2009 at 16:42
I figured "emergent" was actually the exact thing Eva was looking for when I read the OP.
Then again, it's been a few years since that's been thrown around as a buzzword, so maybe they've moved on to some other term.
Sulphur on 28/10/2009 at 16:49
Perhaps, but 'emergent' gameplay doesn't need to exclude player interaction/input from the game's systems, which is the common theme across the three points in Eva's post.
Wormrat on 28/10/2009 at 16:52
I usually hear this advertised as "living world." NPC schedules and need-driven AI and all that jazz.
addink on 28/10/2009 at 17:03
Though 'living world' would be an apt name for the concept Eva described, it is also used for worlds where interaction of NPCs is completely predefined.
perhaps the two should be combined into 'emergent living world'..
Tonamel on 28/10/2009 at 19:13
Yep, you're thinking of emergent behavior/emergent gameplay. Simple rules interacting with each other to create more complicated/surprising behavior.
It was being thrown around as a buzzword when GTA became popular, but most game designers know what it is by this point. It's just become part of the language rather than a Cool Thing.
Zygoptera on 28/10/2009 at 20:10
I'd agree that "Living World" is the best fit as it is used quite often; emergence is too general and has a lot of player mediated behaviours shoehorned onto it when applied to games- though in its original scientific meaning it would fit well- and "sandbox" does not necessarily mean any sort of player independent system or 'realistic ecology' type interactions, just an open world game.
Albeit I'd never heard of 'throwness' previously.
