The basic enjoyment of SIS

[Callan S.]

Going back to my responce to Doctor Xero, I'll look at some of the things he brought up.

...bonding process...Sharing cultural material...Self expression...Belonging to something...

These are all very much about the participants and not the game itself. I'd say these are very powerful elements.

But traditional play and even a lot of game design I see here or elsewhere focuses on the elements in the SIS. Like rewarding characters for killing orcs or addressing premise or what have you.

But is there much support for those elements listed above, among games? A reward for the player for sharing cultural material or self expressing? I would say there are lots of indirect rewards for such, but when it comes to designing games we don't talk about indirectly awarding gamist or narr play. We talk about nailing them with clear and present rewards.

So what about the foundation, the SIS. Where are the rewards for supporting that, really? Do we just expect it, its something people should just do? I think that idea has been applied to roleplay, that people should just do it, you don't need to reward it. And its been debunked.

The most important thing here is that you would be rewarding users for what they are contributing themselves in real life, in terms of sharing culture and self expression, instead of the round about 'as a player you are rewarded for what you do with your avatar'. Instead it'd be a straight reward for what the player does himself.

Possibly suuch an approach isn't intuitive, as the focus on everyone getting into the SIS would then make it odd for the system to concentrate on the people in RL. And counter to traditional gaming culture, it would be about rewarding that person for what they are doing in RL, instead of rewarding pretend character actions.

[Ben O'Neal]

I think a prime difficulty in that is "how do you judge what is to be rewarded"? I mean, most of that stuff is very subjective, and so very hard to predict or control the delivery of rewards. In addition, it is also relative, in that what one player may think is them being very expressive, might seem to others to be shying away. The relativity and subjectivity of these things would be hard to disentangle, but they are seperate.

But I think the biggest issue is "what do you reward them with"? I mean, if you reward RL behaviour with in-game bonuses, then there is a mismatch between what you are rewarding and what the reward does, which M. J. points out in his Applied Theory essay as problematic. But worse, what sort of RL rewards could exist?

I think that games are often viewed (falsely) as a fair playing field for players, because they aren't percieved as competing against each other, so much as moving pieces which compete against other pieces. Kind of like psychologically taking a step back. Rewarding RL behaviour with RL rewards would destroy that illusion, and might scare away players who don't want their personal ability to be challenged or judged directly.

-Ben

[Callan S.]

I think a prime difficulty in that is "how do you judge what is to be rewarded"? I mean, most of that stuff is very subjective, and so very hard to predict or control the delivery of rewards. In addition, it is also relative, in that what one player may think is them being very expressive, might seem to others to be shying away. The relativity and subjectivity of these things would be hard to disentangle, but they are seperate.

The industry has been limping along with 'And X xp reward for good roleplaying' for quite some time now, without actually addressing how subjective that is.

The important thing to note is that whoever is in charge of awarding these is actually expressing their own beliefs and sharing them. Their judement is part of the whole exchange, is isn't really at a level above. Really you only have ask them in the text to think about 'self expression' for example. What they believe to be self expression will be expressed itself through the award. Personally I'd think it'd be good for several award judging positions to be spread (randomly) over several users, instead of just one (which will get you a lot of expression from only one source).

The whole 'X xp award for good roleplaying' has been shaping various groups into things very different from each other for years now. These awards don't need to be standardised, they need to simply help groups build bind of cultural exchange together.

But I think the biggest issue is "what do you reward them with"? I mean, if you reward RL behaviour with in-game bonuses, then there is a mismatch between what you are rewarding and what the reward does, which M. J. points out in his Applied Theory essay as problematic. But worse, what sort of RL rewards could exist?

In the gamist essay, Ron mentions something along the lines that a reward that doesn't do anything isn't much cop. In a post about it I latter said that a reward with no game purpose does have a purpose...I have the reward and you don't. Sports everywhere use sports trophies as well. Baring any geek cultural cringe against someone being awarded something else isn't, its just as valid here and can be spread into a variety of forms to represent various rewards.

In terms of sharing culture, the wording and intent of the reward will have to be fairly careful. But I could fill a whole post on stuff about that and here I'll just leave this note on it.

I think that games are often viewed (falsely) as a fair playing field for players, because they aren't percieved as competing against each other, so much as moving pieces which compete against other pieces. Kind of like psychologically taking a step back. Rewarding RL behaviour with RL rewards would destroy that illusion, and might scare away players who don't want their personal ability to be challenged or judged directly.

-Ben

I wonder if part of RP culture is pandering to these individuals, thus giving them a ghetto to find solace in...and making the hobby a ghetto.

Still, I'll answer it. The illusion you refer to before is a matter of emphasis. Were talking about rewarding SIS support work from users, but obviously the SIS is made to share imaginary stuff. The intent of the work is that the direct SIS support work rewards are like dips and finger foods before a meal...they are tasty, but not the big goal (Though as I suggested, this is no reason not to reward SIS foundation work).