Kevin Slavin, co-founder of Area/Code, spoke at the RSA's Playing The City event on Wednesday night.
Area/Code's initial focus was creating games that use technology but take place in the real world, like PacManhattan. Some of their recent work has had a TV focus, like Parking Wars or Sopranos A&E Connection.
Mint has gone in the opposite direction. We started in TV and, with Football3s, are moving closer to the real world. It felt like we are interested in the same things but from different perspectives.
I can't do justice to his talk, but here are a couple of nuggets.
1. How Google broke the ESP game
ESP game was a wonderful collaborative image labelling game, which was bought by Google and became the Google Image Labeler. Without changing any functionality, Google 'broke the game'. Now, there are fewer players and the high scores are lower, even though the scoring system is the same. With the Google branding on it, it ceases to be a game. Instead it feels like doing free work for a massively profitable multinational.
I recently came across the Crap Crowdsourcing blog, where there is a sense of outrage over the 'Tell the Snickers Story' campaign. This is because the creative company seems to be throwing the brief to the public 'as we can't be bothered'. You feel conned when something is dressed up as play but turns out to be work.
2. It is hard to stare luck in the face
Kevin is currently enjoying Quadradius. It's like checkers but with a bunch of power-ups, allowing your pieces to capture rows and obliterate neighbours. The power-ups introduce a big dose of luck, meaning that beginners can often beat experienced players.
Quadradius is not a sophisticated or polished game, but it is addictive. Why? What is rewarding about luck? Kevin suggested that luck plays an important role in life and it is hard for us, as humans, to acknowledge that. Acknowledging the role of luck, downplays the importance of beliefs we hold dear: things like faith, control or expertise. Because we don't deal well with luck in the real world, it is fun to explore it in games.
Working on Football3s, I sometimes worry that the game is too much about luck (even though many people who play it seem to believe, as Paul Fisher said, 'if only I really concentrated on it, I'm sure I could win all the time'). What types of luck are most fun? What particular alignment of luck makes online bingo such a smash hit? I'm new to games, so this may be a super obvious question (though I can't find any answers online). Any suggestions or links would be much appreciated.
Comments
Andy Bell
21 November, 2009
Wow! After 5 years in social media, Mint's blog now has comments.
Tim Morgan
25 November, 2009
How the devil did Mint manage this? Call the police
Slavin
26 November, 2009
I fucking love this comment capability! That's all I wanted to say.
Actually, I wanted to add that I'm pretty sure the number of players on the Google Image Labeling "game" is greater than the old ESP game -- Google has reach, after all. All I could see from the outside, when I was looking, was that the high scores were lower, even though the point system seemed identical.
Can't confirm where it's at now; the ESP site is gone. But the point's the point.
Sorry, comments are now closed on this post.