jk103 wrote:Since you seem opposed to adding any more interactivity to the game
I'm not angry that people don't understand this. It's actually something that's pretty unique to writers and coders, of which I'm both, and isn't true in most other fields. Since most people don't live it, like I do, it's just not clear. So I'll try to explain it again.
Say you were to go to a mechanical engineer and say, "I want you to make a car that can get a million miles to the gallon." He'd just say, "Can't. Physics."
Say you were to go to an architect and say, "I want you to make a building as tall as the moon." He'd shrug and say, "Can't. Physics."
Say you were to go to an electrical engineer and say, "I want you to make a phone that fits in my pocket but has batteries that last a thousand years on a single charge." He'd look sad and say, "Can't. Physics."
But, say you were to go to a game developer and say, "I want you to put in a thousand separate paths, each governed by my choices." She
can do that. Unlike in the other examples, Physics doesn't stop her. What stops her is
tradeoffs. Tradeoffs are hard to understand. People see an option and think, "It would be easy to do that," and they're right. The trouble is that there a million
other things that are equally easy. Writers and coders need to pick which of those things to do. Because while physics doesn't stop us, time does.
It's not that I'm opposed to adding interactivity to the game. It's that interactivity adds pages, and pages cost time. Here's the kind of decision I faced. Should I:
1) Release RfJ the way I did in February of 2016
2) Release RfJ with twice as much interactivity in February of 2016, but with a total story that ends at the elevator sex scene
3) Release RfJ with twice as much interactivity, with the full RfJ story, but not until February of 2017
This is a rhetorical question. I know the right answer.
But I understand that most people do not work in fields where the only limiting factor is time. When working in a field where physics limits you, I'm sure something as free and simple as time doesn't seem like much of a limiting factor. But try it some time. Spend 6 months writing a game. When you're done, ask yourself, "What's stopping me from making this game twice as long?" It's not physics. And it's not laziness, because when you finish you're going to start writing another one. What's stopping you is that your fans would really like to play your game. So you've got to trade off the benefit they'll get by doubling the length of the game to give them another set of options vs the benefit they'll get by playing it now instead of a year from now (or ten years from now if you add enough options).
Every one of these "add more interactivity" suggestions is really either, "Please give us less story" or "Please make us wait longer to get to play." Those are fine suggestions, and there are games being developed that are following those suggestions. The developers of those games, though, have people suggesting that they get the game done sooner. There's no absolute right answer with tradeoffs.
Tlaero
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