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[gimymblert]

@bakkusa
This thread is filled with them, though if you ask for "good one" they are few and apart and generally old (star control 2).

@dacke
But do you get sandbox period? (genuine question).

maybe the problem isn't procedural but sandbox/toy game.

[Dacke]

@dacke
But do you get sandbox period? (genuine question).

maybe the problem isn't procedural but sandbox/toy game.

yeah, you're right, I guess I don't

but at least if it's hand crafted there's a chance you're exploring a world that someone has put some thought into with unique/surprising/artsy stuff. While with the current state of procedural generation I just feel like I'm sampling data points until I have figured out how the algorithms work

[s0]

i really like hiking in forests. the problem is i don't live near any forests and have to take a very long bus or train ride to get there. hence i don't often get the chance to hike. that's where sandbox games come in.

[gimymblert]

@dacke
Yeah, one thing I learn recently is that SOME people judge things with the potential author in mind, ie they want to relate. Even if procedural generation make thing completely human, knowing it's a machine don't allow to relate (to know someone has made this stuff to surprise you, you could have been this person), it's disappointing.

That's part of the discussion of what "meaning" mean to people. Not all people have this problem, but it mean that PCG can't solve this aspect unless they shift the focus from the algo to the designer. Other form of meaning (ie relatable content and not just relate to human author).

[Dacke]

@silb
I just don't see the fun and don't understand what the fun is that other people see.

Things I find "fun":
- challenging gameplay (overcome obstacles)
- written stories (the more linear the better)
- getting more powerful (rpg, empire building)
- trying to figure out how a system works

What I don't enjoy is derping around in a system I've already figured out. If there's nothing more to figure out and it doesn't lead anywhere, I don't see where the fun is. It's just not stimulating in any way.

@gimymblert
That may be true. But I did say "the current state of procedural generation", because even state-of-the-art stuff gets super predictable and boring extremely quickly imho. Like with No Man's Sky, where you've basically seen it all once you've seen all the basic planet archetypes (which were ~handcrafted).

While something hand crafted can be full of intelligent nuance, even with extremely limited means.

[s0]

the elements endlessly shift and rearrange themselves in everchanging patterns without ever changing their fundamental nature, sort of like indian classical music or modal jazz. you start living inside the patterns, becoming the patterns. the patterns are you and you are the patterns. *puts on headband and round sunglasses* far out maaaaaaaan

[Dacke]

I do enjoy that in music. I can listen to noise all day, doesn't matter if it's created by a human or a machine. But the games I've tried that try to do the same are just so... meh.

Maybe it's the difference between passively enjoying something (music) and actively having to put in work (games).

[Capntastic]

Should I finish No Man's Sky

[s0]

i really like hiking in forests. the problem is i don't live near any forests and have to take a very long bus or train ride to get there. hence i don't often get the chance to hike. that's where sandbox games come in.

i like seeing the cool and funny stuff that can randumbly happen in games. just like it's fun to see some rare animals or a cool looking tree in a forest. those aren't "hand designed" either (unless youre a creationist lol) but regardless they instill a sense of wonder.

like the other day i was playing ck2 and there was this vassal bishop who was so pissed that he wasnt on my council that he declared war on me. problem was, his bishopric was in my home province so it was technically being "besieged" by him. meaning neither him nor me could raise any troops. this made the war a stalemate that could have gone on until the bishop's death. except i raised some other vassal levies and crushed the bishop's nonexistent resistance.

[gimymblert]

Should I finish No Man's Sky

After you beat tetris

[Capntastic]

Should I finish No Man's Sky

After you beat tetris

I've beaten Tetris though

[Capntastic]

More interesting than NMS's ending, from what I hear

[gimymblert]

You haven't beatean tetris, you don't have the hi score, and that's the casual mode nintendo made into the game (and funny things it has procedural generation of level height).

Edit: I mean you need to beat ALL mode to beat tetris.

[s0]

is drawing a hand in poker procedural generation??

[joseph ¯\_(ツ)_/¯]

if poke was exclusively about drawing hands nobody would think it was a good game

(see: yahtzee)

[s0]

huh? what does that even have to do with my post?

[gimymblert]

is drawing a hand in poker procedural generation??

No but shuffling the card is, you are playing with random odds (procedural is not necessarily random).

[JWK5]

@dacke
But do you get sandbox period? (genuine question).

maybe the problem isn't procedural but sandbox/toy game.

yeah, you're right, I guess I don't

but at least if it's hand crafted there's a chance you're exploring a world that someone has put some thought into with unique/surprising/artsy stuff. While with the current state of procedural generation I just feel like I'm sampling data points until I have figured out how the algorithms work

Dacke, basically sandbox games are just a box of toys and a playground to play with them in. Even with games like Grand Theft Auto where they've tacked on a story and whatnot most people I know who play it (sans multiplayer) only ever bother progressing in the story just to get more toys to play with, they are playing the game to cause havoc to see how the game responds to it.

That is really the heart of a good sandbox game: strong feedback. I notice that, especially with sandbox games, the more a game responds to the player's actions the more elaborate their attempts at causing mayhem or setting up reactions will be. You see it manifest a lot in just about any game, from the way people do inappropriate things to the ragdoll bodies in the Metal Gear Solid series just because they can or the way Elder Scrolls players will decimate entire villages and towns just because the game will let them, but sandbox games take it to the extreme. They are built for it.

It's exploration through playfulness, that is what a sandbox game is (a good one anyways). Toys and a playground.

[s0]

is drawing a hand in poker procedural generation??

No but shuffling the card is, you are playing with random odds (procedural is not necessarily random).

that was a rhetorical question btw. "procedural generation" is just a buzzword for a randomized or dynamic starting state, and hence for a particular type of very old game mechanic (just because the player has no control over it doesn't mean it's not a mechanic).

considering that, isn't actually hand designing a level more "innovative" than procedurally generating one? because strict rulesets have been the bread and butter of games for millennia. games that strongly rely on predesigned "content" but aren't pure puzzles on the other hand are a much younger phenomenon. they only reached their (still ongoing) peak in popularity in the 20th century thanks to videogames.

you could say a game like chess relies on fixed content because the starting state is fixed, but the game itself doesnt really follow a script and is also based on dynamic interactions between pieces (i.e. rules).

trolling a bit here tbh, but ive been toying with these thoughts for a while and i felt like this was a good thread to post them in.

[gimymblert]

I don't know, procedural generation is define by using a strict rule set to generate content. Random is a tool within that framework to introduce diversity in the output. And that's it procedural is not a technique it's a framework, an approach, a perspective on doing thing. Game rely on rule set, they are basically procedural experience generator, the idea that a rule set will shape a party and where outcome can be different everytime the input (the player's behavior) change.

Formally procedural generation can be akin to a function P() that takes i inputs x (parameters) to create output O, aka P(x1, ..., xi) = O. Random is one of the input, players behaviors is another, if you seed the random it always produce the same results. So clearly there is nothing new.

The difference is that the data is populated with P instead of being pass as is, the result of P can be indistinguishable from passed data. It's just a way to create the same thing. Even handcraft content can be created by different process, but it doesn't matter if you use photoshop, trace a landscape or pick a photo if the result are the same, it's a tool to have data like others, and like other it's easier to obtain some result than other depending on state of art. The ruleset of generation is still fixed most of the time.

If you consider card as module assign to some values (contextual or fixed), shuffling card effectively is similar as creating a level progression in which a set of element are used to create a progression. Poker is very similar to rogue like in a way, your interaction depend on how you deal with unexpected events (draws).