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It's a game from 2002 or so, and I picked it up for $10 off of a discount rack at Filiene's Basement. And it's got a lot of neat things in it, which manage to make a rather lackluster game.
See, one good thing about it is that the people who made it wanted to make it easily hackable, so it's easy to take it apart to see how it works. And when you do so, you discover something disturbing: the game is having more fun than you are.
Okay, so this is a space empire building game. And it's got lots of AI basically running small bits of the game for you so you don't have to. That's a pretty good idea. But I think it goes too far. . .
Like, spies. You push a button and the game trains a spy. Then you push another button and you send the spy into a rival space empire, and it either does some stuff successfully, or gets captured and killed.
So you take the game apart, and there's this whole set of files on how spies work. Those spies have ratings in being seductive, or secretive, or all sorts of things. They've got all these different options of how they can operate, what they're good at, all sorts of stuff. And the internal security forces of various empires have all these different ratings, too.
So, basically, the COMPUTER is playing this entire complex strategic game on spy insertion and stuff that you don't even get to SEE. It's making all these decision, and you're not. So the computer is having fun, but you just push a button and see if your spy died.
The whole game's like that. Apparently, when you invade a planet, your generals can send commandos in who can do special missions, while psy-ops demoralize the population, hackers disrupt communications, and so forth. And the computer is playing all these games to do that, which, looking at the data files, look like fun. But YOU don't get to play those games. No, the COMPUTER plays those games. You just form an army and send it to the planet, and that's it.
There's an entire set of algorithms about religion, ethos, and philosophy, that determine all sorts of things about how planets interact with other planets, how good they are at research and what kinds of research, what the effects of diplomacy are, how content they are, what they do. Vast impacts on all parts of the game.
I only know that this EXISTS because I was looking at the data files. It never shows up visibly in the game itself.
There's some sort of lesson here about "being clear about what your goal is, and making sure that what you're doing actually benefits your goal." All these things that are in the game are really, really cool, and add NOTHING to the experience of playing it.
See, one good thing about it is that the people who made it wanted to make it easily hackable, so it's easy to take it apart to see how it works. And when you do so, you discover something disturbing: the game is having more fun than you are.
Okay, so this is a space empire building game. And it's got lots of AI basically running small bits of the game for you so you don't have to. That's a pretty good idea. But I think it goes too far. . .
Like, spies. You push a button and the game trains a spy. Then you push another button and you send the spy into a rival space empire, and it either does some stuff successfully, or gets captured and killed.
So you take the game apart, and there's this whole set of files on how spies work. Those spies have ratings in being seductive, or secretive, or all sorts of things. They've got all these different options of how they can operate, what they're good at, all sorts of stuff. And the internal security forces of various empires have all these different ratings, too.
So, basically, the COMPUTER is playing this entire complex strategic game on spy insertion and stuff that you don't even get to SEE. It's making all these decision, and you're not. So the computer is having fun, but you just push a button and see if your spy died.
The whole game's like that. Apparently, when you invade a planet, your generals can send commandos in who can do special missions, while psy-ops demoralize the population, hackers disrupt communications, and so forth. And the computer is playing all these games to do that, which, looking at the data files, look like fun. But YOU don't get to play those games. No, the COMPUTER plays those games. You just form an army and send it to the planet, and that's it.
There's an entire set of algorithms about religion, ethos, and philosophy, that determine all sorts of things about how planets interact with other planets, how good they are at research and what kinds of research, what the effects of diplomacy are, how content they are, what they do. Vast impacts on all parts of the game.
I only know that this EXISTS because I was looking at the data files. It never shows up visibly in the game itself.
There's some sort of lesson here about "being clear about what your goal is, and making sure that what you're doing actually benefits your goal." All these things that are in the game are really, really cool, and add NOTHING to the experience of playing it.