Caltrops - Gamerasutra





	[quote name="Dream Cast"]If we accept that a game is a procedure for generating interesting decisions, and that the decisions are interesting because 1) they influence the game's outcome and 2) the optimal choice is predictable without being obvious, then decisions in games should gradually become more interesting as we get better at predicting their consequences - right up until the point when we get TOO good and the whole thing starts to collapse into rote execution. Mechanical complexity can postpone the collapse - perhaps even indefinitely! - but will first slow the ascent - again, perhaps indefinitely (I will never learn to play go well enough to actually enjoy go, unless something 'go-es' very wrong in my life). At some point far along the enjoyment arc you will put down the controller, you will pick up your pen, and you will tuck it saucily behind your ear as you type up your game review on your Tom Hanks manual typewriter app. It was your job to walk the path of Bubsy the Bobcat and report back, telling us how much fun it came to be and how long the fun part lasted. Punishing games that benefit from intelligent use of shortcuts, out of some misguided sense of fairness to nature or the universe or whatever, is not going to help you keep your readers in a state of maximal entertainment! For that you want to share your PRO TIPS, shepherding us briskly to the fun part of complex games, exposing simpler ones as the glorified puzzles they are (hopefully before we waste too much money on them). Try not to lose sight of the forest for the trees. Remember why you're ranking games in the first place. Besides autism.[/quote]