My personal opinion is that emergent phenomena in games increase player enjoyment, make suspension-of-disbelief easier, and improve gameplay.

http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/1552/the_subversion_game_an_interview_.php

has a very good interview which reads in part:

QuoteThere's a lot of cool emergent stuff in games I think that you can build systems on. We have breakable cover. We have Mini D compared to Stranglehold's Massive D. It's mostly combat cover objects. If the squad goes into low morale, they start taking cover behind stuff, like this bench, and a sniper hits it and it crumbles. You see more breakables because morale went into a low state. It's really cool and unexpected -- who thought that would happen?

.... some huge percentage like 95 or more of people, if they like the game, are sympathetic players. They try to make it work the way it works. If you fuck them -- if the game sucks, or runs at five frames a second, or is tuned badly so it takes five clips to kill a guy -- they become unsympathetic players, and they rebel. The game gets worse for them. It's another positive feedback loop. But 95 percent of players or more are trying to play the game and get enjoyment out of it. I have been that perverse guy, too. That's one of the reasons in Deus Ex that we did the multiple solutions to problems thing.

We all wanted to try to break the systems and see how they worked. Some guy in Deus Ex figured out that you could take a proximity mine and put it on the wall and hop up on it. It had a little lip of physics. Then you could place another one and hop up on it, then turn around, crouch, grab the first mine, and put it up higher. He would just climb out of the world that way. He'd climb the side of tall buildings that we never intended anyone to be on top of. It must've taken hours. But then he would take screenshots from places he wasn't supposed to be. That guy is such a small percentage of the industry, but it's so clever, and it's such a creative use of the game. It's a metagame, at some level. You've just got to applaud that.

 

Quote from: InterviewWe all wanted to try to break the systems and see how they worked. Some guy in Deus Ex figured out that you could take a proximity mine and put it on the wall and hop up on it. It had a little lip of physics. Then you could place another one and hop up on it, then turn around, crouch, grab the first mine, and put it up higher. He would just climb out of the world that way. He'd climb the side of tall buildings that we never intended anyone to be on top of. It must've taken hours. But then he would take screenshots from places he wasn't supposed to be. That guy is such a small percentage of the industry, but it's so clever, and it's such a creative use of the game. It's a metagame, at some level. You've just got to applaud that.

This reminds me of the Min/Max threads on the WotC site where people figure out how to make characters do 500 damage in a single attack.

Quote from: riprockMy personal opinion is that emergent phenomena in games increase player enjoyment, make suspension-of-disbelief easier, and improve gameplay.

I'm sorry, I get no content from this.

What are "emergent phenomena", and how do they do the three groovy things listed above?

Quote from: Old GeezerI'm sorry, I get no content from this.

What are "emergent phenomena", and how do they do the three groovy things listed above?

Agreed.  Less jargon, more plain talk.

Yes, what the fuck are you talking about?

RPGPundit

Ryan D had said something earlier about Emergent phenomena in games like Second Life and Eve Online.  I figured this was a spin off of that which never really took off.

I have no idea why Riprock believes why this makes suspension of disbelief easier, and if you look at the examples of people figuring out how to "break" the game engines... I'd say it's quite the opposite.

I'm still trying to figure out what "emergent phenomena" means.  Or are there phenomena that are emerging, and that's what the OP means?  In which case, what are these phenomena, and how do they increase my fun?

I read the article he linked to, and couldn't figure out what the fuck it had to do with anything.

I'm not trying to be dense.  I'm all in favor of anything I can do to make my gaming more fun.  I just need to know what the hell he's trying to say.:confused:

I think "emergent phenomena" means stuff that happens during the game that allows players to develop their characters, as opposed to thorough development during character generation.

Quote from: walkerpI think "emergent phenomena" means stuff that happens during the game that allows players to develop their characters, as opposed to thorough development during character generation.

Yes, but specifically connoting patterns which can't be anticipated from just reading. Sometimes doing something is far simpler (or more difficult) than it seems from reading about doing it. These 'phenomena' (patterns of behavior) 'emerge' during play.

-clash

Quote from: flyingmiceYes, but specifically connoting patterns which can't be anticipated from just reading. Sometimes doing something is far simpler (or more difficult) than it seems from reading about doing it. These 'phenomena' (patterns of behavior) 'emerge' during play.

-clash

Exactly. It's just that while this may be a cause for designer celebration in video games it's always been par for the course in tabletop RPGs. "Woohoo, players are doing something in/with the gameworld I hadn't anticipated!" Well, yes. I mean, hello? Ten-foot pole?

In terms of computer games, emergent phenomena are non-scripted (and presumably unexpected) events that happen because of the interaction between the pieces of a game engine, player input and AI.

So, for instance, you are playing the game of Life (not the boardgame, this http://www.bitstorm.org/gameoflife/) and you find that certain starting patterns cause the system to fall into a repetative cycle that moves across the screen, or others cause patterns that seem to "breed" other patterns.

In a game with sufficiently complex AI, emergent behavior would be something like the game being able to come up with quests for you. Not the scripted quests that we are used to seeing in CRPGs, or the random quests that a game like Daggerfall presented, but something closer to

• Character A needs food
• Character A checks skill list sees farming and hunting
• Character A checks nearby conditions and chooses farming
• Character A tries to procure farming tools from nearby town
• Character A walks to nearby town and is attacked by wolves
• Character A flees back to his house
• Character A weighs risk/reward and decides to remain home

Now if the player wanders onto Character A at this stage and asks how he is doing, he might hear a little story about the farming, the nearby town and the wolves. He will offer the PC the quest of getting his tools, or killing the wolves... not because it is scripted, but because he needs to get the tools and the wolves are in the way.

Bad examples, I know... and what the heck this has to do with tabletop rpgs? Not so sure really.

Quote from: Pierce InverarityExactly. It's just that while this may be a cause for designer celebration in video games it's always been par for the course in tabletop RPGs. "Woohoo, players are doing something in/with the gameworld I hadn't anticipated!" Well, yes. I mean, hello? Ten-foot pole?

Some cunning linguist designers try to tell you that there are purposefully placed 'emmergent properties' in their games. Must have a crystal ball or something. :confused:

Quote from: One Horse TownSome cunning linguist designers try to tell you that there are purposefully placed 'emmergent properties' in their games. Must have a crystal ball or something. :confused:

Exactly! In TT play, these things are never planned. If they were, they'd be all touted to heck in the banner ads!

-clash

Unfortunately (IMNSHO), there is a sense in which the term is becoming increasingly applicable in D&D: unforeseen feat synergies, Pan-Pan the Kobold god, cetera cetera. The more the gameworld recedes beneath the rules, the more the rules exclusively define what you can do at all--the more the rules will be the site of "emergent" behavior. Emerging on a tabula rasa, to be sure.

Quote from: flyingmiceExactly! In TT play, these things are never planned. If they were, they'd be all touted to heck in the banner ads!

-clash

and then they wouldn't be emmergent properties! Ooh, the irony.