[arg_discuss] Re: Communities and resources

[despain at quantumcontent.com]

> Adam: > This appears not to be a problem - we've been around for 3
>       > months, plenty of time for explorative ARG players to have
>       > discovered and infiltrated us ;), but it seems the
>       > overwhelming majority are happy to leave us alone to do what
>       > we do.
>
> Respectfully, what we do hasn't been very much and those haven't exactly
> been controversy-laden.

I'm with you. I think this is the first test of how this mailing list can
really work. I'm still watching where it goes.

But I admit, I wouldn't have responded to the original question at all
if I hadn't talked with some of you privately at GDC.

> Adam: > Incidentally, this is a current concern - that we could do
>       > with a few more players on the list, as a sounding board, a
>       > second opinion, etc.
>
> I, for one, would prefer not: I think it would make this feel like a
> public forum (and I'd then need to limit my comments the way I would
> in other public forums.) That doesn't mean I'd drop off, just that my
> perceptions would change. Maybe part of this is still a reaction to a
> recent Meta thread at UF from me, but it wouldn't be a bad thing to
> have a "semi-professional" PM community apart from the more public
> interactions with our audiences.
> If the goal is to supplement the experiences of sharing one-on-one,
> the group will also need to be able to maintain the "off the record
> just between you and me" nature of the environments that produce
> those valuable conversations. That's not impossible to do with
> players in the mix (and the zone between designer and player is
> wonderfully fuzzy) but would become more difficult the larger that
> proportion might become.

I agree with you, but don't know what the current proportions are,
and I don't know if there's any way to figure it out. I plan to watch
and see how things go for a while. Hopefully we can experiment without
blowing things to oblivion.


(snipped some for space - all of which I agreed with)

> Wendy : > So I end up feeling like I need to cater to them, but not
>         > let them get total control of the game.
>
> From my perspective, that seems like a totally non-controversial
> observation to make as a game designer without being at all
> incompatible with the Unfiction Consensus. Increasingly, I have a
> harder time predicting (I guess) what will be controversy inducing
> for the ARG community and find myself being more cautious in my
> contributions because of it :(

I'm assuming you mean contributions "out of game"? Or are you being
more cautious in your game design?

Wendy Despain
quantumcontent.com