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[s0]

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).

yes thats exactly my point

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.

but if the end goal is generating the same sort of data a person would generate by hand, isn't it kind of pointless, other than as a technical excercise? woudln't it be better to do things unique to the medium? personally i love levels in games that "feel generated", some games do really cool things with them that you wouldnt see in handcrafted levels.

[gimymblert]

It's an old debate, should painter strive for realism in a world where photography exist? But there is merit anyway, because it's also an automation, ie scale, speed and other perk allow ambition that slow handcraft can't achieve. It's neutral, it has property and you must find your own used. Like I say, it can be used for exploitation (more of the same, better, faster) or exploration.

[JWK5]

The thing that procedural generation gives you that deliberately created assets do not is a sense that what you are getting (in terms of levels or whatever else is generated) is something unique to your current experience of the game.

It'd be like playing soccer the proper way versus playing soccer with an extra set of rules that are randomly shuffled in and out by dice rolls every 5 minutes of play. The static set of rules might create a more balanced and functional game of soccer but the random set of rules could potentially lead to a dramatically different game of soccer every game.

It basically comes down to how much chaos is injected. With a static creation you have more order, but with procedural generation there is more room for chaos (and thus unexpected aberrations in the experience). Both static and procedural experiences still allow for quite a bit more emergent chaos when multiplayer is brought in and you can get a lot of emergent chaos in the single player experience by mixing static and procedural gameplay (where strong expectation is met with strong aberration).

Call of Duty has a good mix of order through its rules and emergent chaos resulting from how each player can bend or leverage the rules, and even in the single player experience Diablo had a nice way of giving you expected boundaries but unexpected chaos within those boundaries through its generated content (loot, mobs, etc.). Dark Souls doesn't really use much in the way of procedural generation but it does allow for a great deal of emergent chaos with how the multiplayer experience can suddenly throw a curve ball into the game of someone engaged in the single player experience. The multiplayer aspects of DS can very much act like a sort of "procedural generation" for the players in the solo experience (blood stains and messages giving glues, red phatoms, etc.).

[gimymblert]

But let's be frank when people discuss PCG they expect "emergent design", pcg don't not always lead to pcg, you need to design the "system" first for emergence for pgc to shine.

[JWK5]

I think a lot of people who cry out for 100% procedural content don't realize that, by its nature, is only going to come out coherent a small portion of the time.

With so much chaos you're basically treading quicksand hoping to find some solid ground somewhere buried in it all. To have anything worth playing (beyond just wanting to see an experiment play out) you're going to have some deliberately created content as a solid ground that the procedural content can be poured onto so that the player isn't just getting swallowed up in all the chaos and left with a fairly vacant experience.

The best procedural games I've played thus far had a good backbone of deliberate content.

[gimymblert]

Don't confuse everything XD, progen don't need to be chaos, you don't have to use random process either. It's not magic! It's basically a coded style guide, if the style guide is not good, it won't produce anything good to begin with.

In fact there is no pcg without deliberate content, that does not exist.

[JWK5]

Don't confuse everything XD, progen don't need to be chaos, you don't have to use random process either. It's not magic! It's basically a coded style guide, if the style guide is not good, it won't produce anything good to begin with.

In fact there is no pcg without deliberate content, that does not exist.

That was my point, the procedural elements only really work on a good backbone of deliberate content. A lot of people seem to think it is solely the procedural aspect providing the bulk of the experience which I think is partly why "procedural generation" are such buzzwords right now (and why I think we see a lot of games popping up that feature it seemingly just to feature it).

The better procedural games I've played leveraged the procedural content to strengthen the experience of the deliberate content rather than just solely relying on the procedural content to carry the game. The worst procedural games I've played seemed to be trying to let the procedural elements carry the game, they felt aimless and more like a tech demo than any kind of game.

In the case of Roguelikes, there are some I've tried where I couldn't make any headway or really get into the game because they got too crazy with the Cheez Wiz and didn't balance out the procedural content well. The good ones I've played seemed to have a strong sense of balance to give you the procedural content in a way that still feels deliberate. You get a sense of order within the chaos which helps you better navigate it.

[Dacke]

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.

Indeed, I do feel that way about nature. It's just that the current state of procgen generally is way too predictable for me to be surprised (maybe because I'm a programmer). I'd rather just go out and watch some ants or something.

[quantumpotato]

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.

Indeed, I do feel that way about nature. It's just that the current state of procgen generally is way too predictable for me to be surprised (maybe because I'm a programmer). I'd rather just go out and watch some ants or something.

I found ants carrying other, smaller ants this year. Freaky. Later I found an ant that looked to be.. eating.. another, dead ant.





NMS is all about emergent visuals, but not so much emergent gameplay, no? Thinking of Rogue, Spelunky, Dwarf Fortress, EVE, Space Station 13, etc, etc. If you've played NMS and seen emergent gameplay I'm curious to hear of it.

[Tanner]

that's some uzumaki shit right there

[gimymblert]

I don't think nms is emergent beyond the small bug adventure, like "finding a way out of the inside mesh", or adventure in "stuck spaceship inside a cave", or "stranded because I think plutonium where plentiful everywhere", or "cheating the sentinel in tunnels on gravitano ball planet".

[gimymblert]

[gimymblert]

[gimymblert]

[gimymblert]

"ring planet"

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[gimymblert]

[s0]

Starglider 2, developed by Argonaut Software before they made Starfox

[gimymblert]

GOOD!

[s0]

DID U KNOW: Argonaut was one of two British companies contracted by Nintendo in the early 90s (the other was Rare obv). At the time the British game industry was at the forefront of 3D tech and Nintendo was looking to experiment with 3D.

The game that later became Starfox was originally meant to be a remake of Starglider. Argonaut basically persuaded Nintendo to let them design the Super FX chip for better polygonal graphics. Miyamoto told them to make the game on rails rather than free roaming and add cartoon animals to it.