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By nature: an exploration of effects of time on localized gameplay systems

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By nature: an exploration of effects of time on localized gameplay systems

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Content BY NATURE: AN EXPLORATION OF EFFECTS OF TIME ON LOCALIZED GAMEPLAY SYSTEMS by Michael Stephen Rossmassler A Thesis Presented to the FACULTY OF THE USC SCHOOL OF CINEMATIC ARTS UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree MASTER OF FINE ARTS (INTERACTIVE MEDIA) May 2009 Copyright 2009 Michael Stephen Rossmassler ii Dedication To the Rossmassler family: my mother Julie, my father Rich, and my sisters Karen and Laura. To my thesis advisers Rich, Tracy and Peter. iii Acknowledgements By Nature owes many things to many people. Kylan Coats, who helped shape the visuals and direction of the game, was an amazing artist who helped to push the creative direction of the game. To Jamie Antonisse and Diana Hughes, who helped out playtesting and with talking me down from stupid idea-ledges. My thesis advisers, Rich, Tracy and Peter, made sure that the crazy ideas I stuck with were feasible, and stuck by me in my hour of need. My classmates, John, Andre and RJ, for all the nights spent play games instead of making them, deserve thanks for helping to keep me sane. Colin McGinn and Pete Angstadt were perennial playtesters, and were incredibly helpful, even from long distances. To Kurosh ValaNejad and Todd Furmanski, who are both inspirations, teachers and friends. Also, to Mark Bolas, Jeb Havens, Peter Preuss, Marientina Gotsis, Adrienne Capirchio, Scott Fisher and to all my classmates. To Matt Korba, Paul Bellezza, Jesse Vigil, Mike Stein, Peter Van Dyke, Logan Olson, Sean Bouchard, Ala’Diab. To Peggy Weil, for helping me to narrow down a mammoth concept into something that was merely huge. To anyone I forgot, sorry, you know how crazy life is. iv Table of Contents Dedication ii Acknowledgements iii List of Figures v Abstract vi Preface: Keywords vii Introduction 1 Project Description 1 Concept 1 Prior Art 4 Prior Art – Games 4 Prior Art – Art 5 Evaluation 6 Contributions 7 User Experience 7 Previous Iterations 10 Evaluation Scenarios 16 Discussion 18 Conclusion 24 Bibliography 26 v List of Figures Figure 1: Screenshot of the current version of the game 9 Figure 2: Screenshot of first working prototype 11 Figure 3: Examples of the strategy prototype pieces 14 Figure 4: Screenshot of the winter build of the game 15 vi Abstract This paper describes an iterative exploration of time as a game mechanic in localized systems. The investigation examines time as a spatial entity, the effects of localized time, and also the way that time affects player choices in complex systems. The process of design discussed here has led to the creation of a particular game, By Nature, which examines how time affects artificial and natural systems in different ways, particularly the complexities that arise and distinguish one system from another. vii Preface: Keywords Time games, time, local time, stylus games, Zen games, plant games, gardening games, drawing games, plants, Lindenmayer Systems, Great Depression, science-driven game design 1 Introduction The initial inspiration for this body of work came from thought experiments surrounding the functionality of the theories of relativity, and from the depiction of time in video games and fiction. The four main goals for the project are: encouraging the player to develop and explore a relationship with time, conveying the phenomena of separate, localized timelines, exploring the way that time brings life to the environment, and developing innovative mechanics that would express the above ideas. Project description The body of work produced for this thesis is a number of prototypes that explore different aspects of the four goals regarding the role and function of time. The final game, By Nature falls into the genre of "Zen" games, where the player must balance time spent actively playing the game with time spent contemplating the more complex issues that the game addresses. Specifically, the player must solve situations that arise from the interplay of localized time and decay in an environment devastated by the Great Depression. Concept Localized time refers to a phenomenon where the flow of time differs from location to location. In addition, the quality of rate of change of time is not static, meaning that two identical stop watches can appear to equate different amounts of time to the passage of a 2 minute to a third party observer. The concept of local time is also features a resource that can be moved from place to place, changing the rate of change of time based upon its concentration. In many ways, localized time can be conceptualized as a subjective form of time, where individual objects are embedded in their own timelines, and decoupled from an overarching timeline. Localized time differs from other models of the passage of time, like Bullet Time (Warner Brothers) or non-linear time (Goertzel), in that is a miniaturization and approximation of the function and flow of that time undergoes on a galactic scale. Bullet Time locks all of the objects in an environment to a single time line, and privileges one actor with the ability to move at a differing rate. In contrast, localized time allows for each actor to move at his own rate, without privileging one actor with control over the others. Localized time also differs from non-linear time, which is a multi-dimensional association of semi-discrete, temporal “chunks” of information gleaned from the environment, who bear information on their location in space and time. The relationship between these chunks is dependent upon the manner in which they are accessed, and as such, differs from the concept of localized time, because localized time does not allow for the concept of post-facto reordering. Additionally, it is important to distinguish the concept of localized time from the idea of speed. Whereas changing the speed of an action will cause that action to resolve in less time for both the object that is acting and for the observer, localized time will cause an action to resolve in the same amount of time 3 for the object that is acting, but at a different rate for the observer, depending on that observer’s local frame of reference. As a goal, I wanted to provide the player with a unique experience where the interaction with time is both joyful and meaningful. The player is provided with situations that require mental models of the game, both spatially and temporally. The main mode of physical interaction with the majority of the game prototypes is through a stylus. This interaction design was developed to encourage player creativity in the tasks at hand, since the more traditional modes of game command input (mouse and keyboard or gamepad) are very mechanical and generalized. By taking advantage of the gestures that the player has already associated with a stylus or pen, the player does not have to learn a new control schema, and can instead focus on intuitive, flexible use of the rules of the system. The intended audience of the game is artistically-literate gamers, meaning players who are interested in fine art as well as gaming. The ideal player would be someone with at least a cursory knowledge of the history of games, as well as knowledge of the history of the Great Depression, and a basic literacy in the function and expression of time. The ideal player does not need to consider himself a “hardcore gamer,” but is open to new experiences, and is interested in “art” games. 4 The stated goals for the project largely focus on the function of localized time. The successive design iterations create and refine a game system involving malleable, localized. Within the rules of each prototype, the player was given access to different variations of subjective forms of time. Each of these prototypes presented a different view of the player’s relationship to the functionality of time, exploring the ways that this relationship to time affects gameplay, thereby bringing life and activity to the game space. Prior Art The main inspirations for the various iterations of this thesis, both mechanic and artistic, are from traditional games, as well as interactive art, cinema, and television. Prior Art - Games The technique of using the stylus to create lines that affect the world is influenced by a number of Nintendo DS games. Kirby Canvas Curse (HAL Laboratory) gives the player agency over the avatar by transforming the player's stylus gestures into ramps and paths for the avatar to transverse. The Night Journey (Viola) offers an open-world natural experience where the meaning and direction are largely dependent on the player to direct and form. Linger In Shadows (Plastic) offers the player an experience that is less goal- oriented in nature than the traditionally-defined game, but still allows for interactivity and exploration. Games designed to mimic artistic processes, like Chalk (Sandberg), use the 5 line drawn by the player as the primary mode of interacting with the environment. Line Rider (Cadež) is a game where the ability to draw is not only used for interaction, but also for expression. The design exploration outlined in this paper also has roots in games based on time. Games which present time as a resource, like Prince of Persia: the Sands of Time (Ubisoft Montreal) or Braid (Number None, Inc), feature mechanics focus on ways for the player to capitalize on the manipulation of time. Other games, like The Sims (Maxis) allow for player manipulation of time, to create a more pleasurable play experience. Prior Art - Art From non-interactive art, this thesis is heavily influenced by cinematic works, due to common relationships on themes of time and nature. The works of Bill Viola are particularly influential due to their reflection on the beauty and mystery of the natural, and their deliberate ambiguity of time. The History Channel show Life After People (de Vries) explores the timeline of the return of plant life to the world after the disappearance of mankind. The movie Baraka (Fricke) demonstrates the compression of time, and draws beautiful parallels between the complexities of the environments that man fashions for himself, and those that grow from nature. In several of his books, Philip K Dick addresses the concept of non-linear or non-standard time. Novels like Martian Time Slip (Dick, Martian Time Slip), or Time Out of Joint (Dick, Time Out of Joint) subject the 6 characters to a dynamic representation of time. Furthermore, the mathematical game Sprouts (Conway) was an influence on the plant-based mechanics of the prototypes. Evaluation Prior games like Chalk or Kirby Canvas Curse do an excellent job of making the task of drawing a line relevant to gameplay, but only use the stylus to indicate direction. Line Rider allows for a tremendous amount of personalization, but lacks overarching narrative. The line-drawing mechanics of Crayon Physics (Purho) are elegant, but the visual results and the narrative lack grander meaning. Video pieces like Baraka and Life After People provide visual experience for the phenomena of the time and its relation to life, but lack the interaction and expression that make games and the lessons learned from play so compelling. Prince of Persia: the Sands of Time is also limited by the adherence to the global timescale, though it does allow for a limited amount of time manipulation. This manipulation is useful in solving puzzles or reversing player death, but the player’s complete mastery of time within the space ignores all of the complexities of time. Braid addresses the concept of location-dependent time, but again, these phenomena are static and unchanging. Braid also tends to be a cursory experience, touching on small portions of time-related concepts, but without addressing them fully, or addressing the repercussions that these concepts could create. The functionality of time in The Sims is 7 design solution that allows for players to affect the length of their play session for convenience, but does not function as a gameplay mechanic. Contributions The most important issue that this body of work addresses is the player’s agency in the control of localized time. In developing systems around the concept, I proved that most elegant and relatable system is embodied in the process of plant growth and decay. In this proof, I discovered that concept of malleable localized time was better suited for thought experiments than for simple gameplay mechanics. User Experience The player's experience in the current playable version of By Nature is, for the majority of the levels, a shallow graded tutorial experience that introduces the player to the mechanics of the game. This portion of the game features relaxed rules and goals, allowing for a gradual immersion into the system. In this game system, the most basic actions that the player can take are tapping the stylus and drawing a line with the stylus. Upon entering the game, the player is presented with a small seed in a dry, desolate landscape. By tapping on the seed and moving the stylus, the player generates a line that is transformed into the approximate path of a vine. The game system slowly grows this line into a vine, with sporadic leaves along the body and a bud on the end. In addition, the system generates a root, which grows into the soil beneath the seed. 8 Once the player's line has grown into a full vine, several things can happen. If left unattended, the vine will begin to wither, gradually turning brown before finally shrinking back into nothing. The player can use this decay as a "passive eraser," choosing to remove all or part of a vine through inactivity. In order to combat this natural process of atrophy, the player can do two things. By drawing child vines branching off of the first vine, the player can create younger generations of growth. These younger generations are thinner and shorter, but will begin to atrophy before their parents do. Another measure that the player can take is to grow flowers on the ends of the vines. By growing a flower, the vine is "sealed" from future decay, and will eventually return to full health. In essence, the function of a flower is to stop a vine in time, preserving its form and beauty for the player. Each vine decays at its own rate, based upon the speed with which the player drew the line. In this manner, time is relative to each vine individually, though this can also be appropriately described as a relationship to a central timeline. Furthermore, in the current version of the game (fig. 1), time functions as a “passive eraser,” first withering an unattended vine, and later decaying that vine entirely. 9 Figure 1. Current Version. The system response to the growth of a vine is the production of a root. Each root is a rough approximation of the related vine, mirrored and flopped across the ground level. In keeping with the setting, the player must grow the root structure so that the plant is able to survive the challenges of the harsh environment. This can include tasks such as collecting water and nutrients, or surviving the ravages of a dust storm. Correctly solving these tasks involves the correct placement of root structures to ensure that the plant reaches necessary areas both above and below the ground level. Completing the level’s tasks will end the game portion of the level, night falls, and game transitions to a free- grow portion that will allow the player to continue to grow the plant until he chooses to 10 advance. In this manner, the player is freed from the time constraints that system holds over him in the play sections. Upon advancing to the next level, the area of play will advance into the background, moving the story out from the dust bowl, towards the larger world, showing the player the effects of the Great Depression. Previous Iterations By Nature is a game that is born of iteration, and as such, has grown into something that on the surface bears little resemblance to the original prototypes. As a designer, I kept a notebook detailing the game design and the issues surrounding that design. This notebook functions as a comprehensive history of the various ideas and iterations the game went through. As such, each of these previous iterations represents a design experiment, and each is just as important in informing the hypothesis as the final project. In an effort to prove out the concept of localized time, I built a number of prototypes to flesh out the mechanics of the motion of time that I had designed. In developing each of these prototypes, I refined the functionality of the time mechanics in response to feedback derived from playtests. As the time mechanics evolved, the focus moved away from local time, and onto time as a catalyst for change. Each of these prototypes represents a distinct relationship to the functionality of time as a game mechanic. The user experience is designed to give agency over different aspects of the flow of time within the prototype. I 11 created a significant number of prototypes, but for the purposes of this paper, I will focus on five distinct prototype iterations. Figure 2. First Prototype. The first prototype (fig. 2) was a top-down adventure game designed around a patent clerk whose relationship to time was dependent on his location in space. This prototype involved a system where resources called "Nimeshas" affected the flow of time could be shared across space. The word Nimesha come from the Hindu unit of measure for small increments of time, and corresponds roughly to the time it takes for a person’s eye to blink. 12 Principally, Nimeshas function as a quantification of the resource that affected the rate of flow of time in a localized space. More Nimeshas in a small area meant that time would move quickly in that area, whereas fewer Nimeshas would mean that time moved slowly in that area. Nimeshas functioned similarly to heat, in that they move from areas of high activity to low activity, in an attempt to reach equilibrium. By interacting with different objects, the player’s avatar could gain or lose Nimeshas, which would allow him to speed up or slow down the objects in his environment. Furthermore, the player’s avatar was also subjected to the rules of Nimeshas, meaning that his activity rate was dependant on the number of Nimeshas he was currently infused with. An avatar with more Nimeshas could move and act more quickly, while if he had fewer, his movements and actions would be slower. Another effect of interacting with objects in the environment was that amount of Nimeshas left with the player’s avatar after equilibrating with the objects would affect his speed. Applying this concept to single instances of objects was relatively straightforward to design, but complications arose when trying to design for complex chains of interactions. In a later paper prototype, I began to explore the feedback loops that would occur when mechanic systems were subjected to these rules of time. Subjecting complex gear arrays created priority problems when different gears were subjected to different amounts of Nimeshas, forcing them to conform to different areas of localized time. Trying to sort out 13 influence and forces between gears turning at different rates became prohibitively complex, as a rapidly turning gear interlocked with a slowly turning gear would not occur. Instead, each gear would be forced to conform to the speed of the other. The gameplay possibilities inherent in this system were disappointingly limited, leading me to apply the concept of local time to other types of situations. In this situation, the player needed to understand the rules that the Nimeshas operated under. Since these rules were largely based on particle and quantum physics, players were often unclear on what Nimeshas were, and as a result, how they affected time in localized spaces. The next prototype I built was a top-down strategy game, which retained the Nimeshas, but was designed around the propagation of avatars based upon their Nimeshas. Shifting the narrative away from a person, I chose to instead design the game around the growth and propagation of natural and man-made systems in an environment. The number of Nimeshas would affect the growth pattern in addition to affecting activity rate of an object. The paper prototype I built around this mechanic allowed the player to redistribute Nimeshas freely, amongst nature-based gameplay elements like vines, grass, and dirt (fig. 3) and man-made gameplay elements like rock walls, fences, and ruins. The player’s goal was to use the available Nimeshas to grow plants over the man-made elements, and then remove them from the environment. In order to remove the objects from the environment, the player would have to cause a fire, and direct it by adding or removing Nimeshas from the objects that were being burned. 14 Figure 3. Strategy prototype pieces. Playtests showed that the most difficult part of the game was the player’s inability form cohesive mental models for why and how adding or removing Nimeshas from an object would affect the way that that object grew or burned. However, the mechanic that players liked the best was directing the growth of plants across the environment. The lines that I used to trace the player’s path for growth resembled the vines that the player was affecting, and as such, it was a simple process to turn them into the vines themselves. In this iteration, I relaxed the rules that governed Nimeshas. Though this did help the players to understand their function, there was still uncertainty surrounding exactly what the quantity of Nimeshas meant to the gameplay. 15 Figure 4. Winter build. The next major prototype (fig. 4) again switched designs, to a side view of a plant that the player could grow and bloom. By using the stylus, the player could draw lines from a base plant, which system would translate into flowering vines. After researching projects on generative worlds (Furmanski), I decided to integrate Lindenmayer systems (Lindenmeyer) to efficiently store the basic structure of a vine. At this point, I chose to represent Nimeshas with drops of water poured from a watering can, to build player associations between Nimeshas and their function in accelerating plant growth. By 16 transforming Nimeshas in this manner, I build the model that a plant that was given more water would produce vines that could grow faster and father, similar to the manner in which objects with more Nimeshas acted more quickly. In addition, I integrated a physics system to control a brick wall that the player could interact with. By growing vines up the brick wall, the vines would begin to crumble the bricks that they grew across. The rate of this decay was based upon the number of vines, and the amount of water (alternately, the number of Nimeshas) that the vine was imbued with. As the plant grew vines above ground, it sent roots down into the soil below. In this prototype, time was a per-plant property, although the world operated on its own timescale. Evaluation scenarios As with any experience intended to engage the actions of an audience; the only reliable method of evaluation is testing. In this case, I used both formal and informal playtesting to garner user feedback. Informal feedback was recorded in my notebook, and ranged from criticism and relevant media, to inspirational quotes and storyboards. As a practice, I would take notes of any playtests that I observed in the journal, and formulate a set of tasks based on these notes. Once the design began to firm up, I adopted a more structured playtest philosophy, complete with a questionnaire documenting user experience, as well as user interests that would help to contextualize the responses. 17 The previous section outlining earlier iterations of the game demonstrates the major gameplay milestones that the game went through. Confusion over the term "Nimeshas," as well as the function of the resource it quantified was a major factor in the move away from a game based on relative time. Along these lines, my desire to adhere to scientific principles and theories was set aside when it became clear that it was hampering the player's mental model of the gameplay. As I built more and more prototypes, it became apparent that the mechanic of localized time was actually interfering with the player’s understanding of how time worked within the context of the game. Throughout the process of creating this game, the main impetus for change has been user feedback. Once the project had reached Alpha, I began structured user testing, which was accompanied by playtest questionnaires. These questionnaires provided information both on the tester's experience and on the tester themselves. The responses that I got highlighted a flaw in my design theory; I had created something that was partway between a toy and a game. The most common complaint about the system was the lack of a concrete goal or end state. In the search for a mechanic that players found enjoyable, I succeeded, but I had not created an end-state that was pleasing. This data showed two things: that the system had to be transformed from a toy into a game, and that players liked the freedom of the system, but wanted some reason to be creative. Based upon further feedback, and I converted the steps for describing how to use the different parts of the system into a tutorial, with win conditions based around successful completion of 18 each step of the tutorial. In this manner, the player could be given discrete tasks that were easily accomplished, but still increased in difficulty. User testing also was important to eliminate clarity issues. Early on, I found that users ignored information presented on the bottom half of the screen, because there was nothing interactive in that section. Not only did the users not read the text on the bottom of the screen, they often would ask the very question that the information on the bottom of the screen answered. Furthermore, the player's expectation of interaction with the plant on-screen mirrored a player's interaction in real life. The idea that "When all [the user has] to do to is reach out and touch something, it becomes a larger source of frustration when this simple action does not deliver as expected," (Meredith) manifests itself in the game, in the player's willing acceptance of control over the above-ground elements (the vines), and lack of precise manipulation of those below ground (the roots). This concept also applies to earlier prototypes, where difficulty in connecting the number of Nimeshas with their effects made the game system hard for the player to form a mental model of. Discussion As a gameplay mechanic, the concept of localized, subjective time is difficult for the player to relate to. Of the four primary goals, the player feedback from playtests provided ample evidence to evaluate the validity of these theses. 19 The prototypes, particularly the paper strategy prototype, were able to convey to the player the phenomena of separate, subjective timelines. Players were able to conceptualize the ability to move Nimeshas about in an environment, and as a result, were able to see how time affected each object differently. Unfortunately, players had difficulty conceptualize why this resource would affect objects in varied ways. Player expectation based upon real-world knowledge of time influenced the player’s relationship to the timelines within the game. Furthermore, the player’s relationship to his own timeline meant that the approaches I took to the system were actually obliterating any mental models of time that the player was building. After further study, I propose that altering the delivery of information to the player would help to clarify the player’s relationship to the timelines in the system. By separating portions of the overarching game into distinct visual containers, and associating sounds with each sub-screen container, the visual and audio could be sped up or slowed down in relationship to the timeline of each sub-screen, thereby differentiating the passage of time in each to player in a concise manner. Using the various prototypes to explore the way that time brings life to different game situations and environments was the most illuminating and successful of the design experiments. For me as the designer, I was able to demonstrate that time affects life across a number of very different prototypes. Ironically, the paradoxes produced within the designs centered on man-made systems provided the most data, despite the fact that 20 they were the least successful game design experiments. The inability to resolve the outcome of interactions of gears attempting to rotate and affect one another while under the influence of different amounts of Nimeshas demonstrated the complexities of the system in a manner that demonstrated interesting complexities, but ultimately made it impossible to use as a game mechanic, in relation to rigid systems. In the prototypes involving the growth of vines interacting with bricks, playtests showed that while players did not understand why Nimeshas would affect the growth of plants, they did understand that more vines would accelerate the decay of the bricks. Though this was not what I had set out to prove with these prototypes, it nevertheless showed that the mechanic of action affecting time was valid and compelling. I expanded this idea of time and action influencing one another in the latest design, By Nature. As an entity, the plant that the player grows and decays at different rates, depending on the choices the player makes in creating that plant. Player choice and neglect in maintaining the plants unfortunately reinforces the concept of a central timeline for all of the objects, but forces the player to examine each object’s relationship to that central timeline. This consideration of the relationship between the objects informs what choice the player will make next, and as such, helps to validate the third goal, of encouraging the player to examine his relationship to time. 21 The fourth goal, of developing fun and innovative game mechanics, is an attempt to conceptualize the result of developing a game that players want to play. The first few iterations of the prototype were not encouraging. The density of the system, combined with the unfamiliarity of many of the concepts portrayed, often left the players confused as to what the outcomes of their actions would be. In shaving down the feature and concept set, the player experience became more gratifying, and it became much easier for the player learn the rules of gameplay. Another important aspect of this process was the development of an in-depth tutorial. Once introduced to the mechanics in a clear and concise manner, players were more able to use the system to produce results that they expected. When playing the current iteration, By Nature, playtesters will often continue to grow plants while relating their experiences to me, which I take as an indication that the mechanics are compelling and fun. This also raises an interesting exploration of the way that the mechanics affects player’s relationship to time outside of the game. In dividing his attention between the game and another task, the player shows the way in which he allocates his time resources. While the design principles of localized is fundamentally based in valid theory (Sauvé), the subjectivity of the passage of time is based solely on the frame of reference. Furthermore, according to the laws of relativity, time can be distorted by both the frame of reference and by gravity (Wolfe). While this does prove that the foundations of the gameplay mechanics are scientifically valid, player feedback showed that the system was 22 too complex for most players, and that users would prefer mechanics that were elegant but scientifically shaky over mechanics that were scientifically valid but inscrutable. The paradoxes that the system tends to produce and cause obfuscate the mechanics, and force the player out of game space in jarring ways. In building the player experience for the prototypes, I was very concerned with building games that would be accessible to all types of players. As such, there was constant tension within the design as to what the gameplay challenges were. While the system was based on allocation of resources, the most natural way to balance the system was to change the availability of the resources. In adjusting the difficulty for later levels, I ran into the problem that simply making the Nimeshas more available to the opposition was detracting from the play experience, as "this can actually change the consistent play type of the game, and thus change the experience in a fundamental and arguably unsatisfying way." (Boutros) Without changing the situations that the player was responding to, and instead shifting resources from the player to the system, I was complicating the player’s tasks without augmenting the player’s process of understanding the gameplay mechanics. The journey from time as a malleable resource to time as a function of change was full of missteps and unexpected turns. As a designer, I sought to always present the player with a game where the choices at hand had to be measured against the way in which the passage of time would affect the outcome of that choice. It was important for me to 23 depict time in games as fundamental a property as the space that the player transverses. The time that a player spends with a game system is precious, and I feel that previous attempts to address time in the concepts of games have tended to trivialize the player’s relationship to time, or reduce the function of time to moments of “oh, that’s neat.” As such, every iteration of the game system tended to reduce the player’s agency over time. Rather than broadly address several very complex but subtle subcategories of the phenomena of localized time, I chose instead to focus on the way that time affects life, particularly plants. In doing so, I was better able to develop mechanics that demonstrate the subjectivity of time in one specific instance. The system that I designed for the final iteration addresses not only addresses the way that time affects plants, but the ways in which time affects the environment as a whole, through its effects on those plants. Though the word Nimesha no longer appears in the project, its influence on the design process is evident. In attempting to quantify a phenomenon like time, I was addressing a larger concept than I expected or intended. By linking time with space, and allowing the player to manipulate both, I was actually moving away from the core of the concepts I wanted to address. Instead of looking at how time affected an object, I was looking at how time affected both the object and the space around that object. By focusing on the way that the player interacted with the object, I could more clearly focus the player on considering the role that time plays in life. 24 The player’s perception of time in the various iterations of the game concept is of a fairly fluid medium, meaning that the player’s perception of the rate with which time passes may change from moment to moment. Scott McCloud states that without a recognizable frame of reference, “We’re left with only a vague sense that our eyes are moving through space, they’re also moving through time – we just don’t know by how much.” (McCloud) This means that to the player, objects designed to operate on different timelines may simply appear to be moving at different rates on the same timeline. Without comparing the frame of reference for each object, the distinction between speed and the rate of change of time is difficult to comprehend. In the prototypes I created, the player can only view the passage of time from one perspective, meaning the effects of manipulating the flow of time is not seen by the player. This lack of comparison effectively compresses the effects of localized time into a single timeline, which makes it much more difficult to distinguish speed from timeline transversal. In the end, it appears that the concept of localized time is too general and theoretical a concept to be translated directly into game mechanics. However, as a reference point for the development of related mechanics, it offers a wealth of possibilities across as wide range of genres. Conclusion The design goals central to the various prototypes created for this thesis are all focused on the concept of localized time. The process of designing and creating these prototypes, as well as the results generated from their playtesting provide valuable feedback on these 25 design goals. Though the actual implementation and execution of each of these goals has varied from prototype to prototype, the core player experience has always been about the relationship between time and life. The player’s relationship to game, and to the objects in the game are all mediated by time, both the time that the player invests in playing the game, and in the ways that the player allocates time to solve various tasks at hand. 26 Bibliography Baraka. Dir. Ron Fricke. 1992. Boutros, Daniel. Difficulty is Difficult: Designing for Hard Modes in Games. 2009. <http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/3787/difficulty_is_difficult_designing_.php?pr int=1>. Cadež, Boštjan. Line Rider. 2006. <linerider.com>. Conway, John. "Sprouts." 1967. Dick, Philip K. Martian Time Slip. United States: Ballantine, 1964. —. Time Out of Joint. United States: J.B. Lippincott Company, 1959. Furmanski, Todd. Here Be Dragons: Emergent Procedural Landscapes. 2005. <http://interactive.usc.edu/members/todd/archives/furmanski_thesis_paper.doc>. Goertzel, Ben. Delay Vectors as Perceptual Chunks: Understanding Nonlinear Time Series Analysis. 1998. <http://www.goertzel.org/dynapsyc/1999/NonlinearTimeSeriesAnalysis.html>. HAL Laboratory. "Kirby Canvas Curse." Nintendo, 2005. Life After People. Dir. David de Vries. 2008. Lindenmeyer, Aristid. ""Mathematical models for cellular interaction in development." Journal of Theoretical Biology 18 (1968): 280--315. Maxis. "The Sims." Electronic Arts, 2000. McCloud, Scott. Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art. New York: HarperCollins, 1993. Meredith, Wade. Best Practices of Touch Screen Interface Design. 2008. <http://voltagecreative.com/blog/2008/05/best-practices-of-touch-screen-interface- design/ >. Number None, Inc. "Braid." Microsoft Game Studios, 2008. Plastic. "Linger In Shadows." SCEA, 2008. 27 Purho, Petri. Crayon Physics Deluxe. 2008. <http://www.crayonphysics.com/>. Sandberg, Joakim. Chalk. 2008. <konjak.org>. Sauvé, Vincent. Why Time is Absolute, and Relative, But Never Universal. 15 January 2000. <http://home.pacbell.net/skeptica/time.html>. Ubisoft Montreal. "Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time." Ubisoft, 2003. Viola, Bill. "The Night Journey." 2008. Warner Brothers. Bullet Time Text. <http://whatisthematrix.warnerbros.com/cmp/sfx- bullet_text.html>. Wolfe, Joe. Relativistic time dilation. <http://www.phys.unsw.edu.au/einsteinlight/jw/text_module4.htm>.

Abstract (if available)

Abstract This paper describes an iterative exploration of time as a game mechanic in localized systems. The investigation examines time as a spatial entity, the effects of localized time, and also the way that time affects player choices in complex systems. The process of design discussed here has led to the creation of a particular game, By Nature, which examines how time affects artificial and natural systems in different ways, particularly the complexities that arise and distinguish one system from another.

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University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses

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Asset Metadata

Creator Rossmassler, Mike Stephen (author)

Core Title By nature: an exploration of effects of time on localized gameplay systems

School School of Cinematic Arts

Degree Master of Fine Arts

Degree Program Interactive Media

Publication Date 05/05/2009

Defense Date 03/30/2009

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag drawing games,gardening games,Great Depression,Lindenmayer Systems,local time,OAI-PMH Harvest,plant games,Plants,science-driven game design,stylus games,Time,time games,Zen games

Language English

Contributor Electronically uploaded by the author (provenance)

Advisor Fullerton, Tracy (committee chair), Brinson, Peter (committee member), Lemarchand, Richard (committee member)

Creator Email mikerossmassler@gmail.com,rossmass@usc.edu

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-m2186

Unique identifier UC1501711

Identifier etd-Rossmassler-2865 (filename),usctheses-m40 (legacy collection record id),usctheses-c127-236251 (legacy record id),usctheses-m2186 (legacy record id)

Legacy Identifier etd-Rossmassler-2865.pdf

Dmrecord 236251

Document Type Thesis

Rights Rossmassler, Mike Stephen

Type texts

Source University of Southern California (contributing entity), University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses (collection)

Repository Name Libraries, University of Southern California

Repository Location Los Angeles, California

Repository Email cisadmin@lib.usc.edu