Game Theory Podcast

Recorded on May 21, 2013 with Brian Fife, James Fingal and Thomas Westberg.

Streamlining - the way the sequels of a game, or games in a genre are re-worked to be simpler, easier - sometimes even with a dramatically transformed core mechanic - is covered in this live episode.

Brian also adds nostalgia to the discussion list. The group talks about the way we hold old, complicated games in reverence (as well as the resurgence of k...

Recorded on March 26th, 2013 with Brian Fife, James Fingal and Thomas Westberg.

Now that video games are big business - perhaps bigger than movies - they have advertising and promotional budgets to match. It is common to see video games promoted in a way similar to other mass media - billboards and television ads.

The group talks about the way they learn about games, keep up on game news (or at least used to) and the way game r...

Recorded on March 11, 2013 with Brian Fife, James Fingal and Thomas Westberg.

Online games purportedly exist to bring us together and create memorable communal experiences. Few mainstream games actively cultivate positive interactions among their players. Players, particuarly when they are fired up and competitive, can get pretty rough.

Tom reminds Brian and Jim that they are all elitist jerks, and Brian discusses his internal ...

Recorded on February 20th, 2013 with Brian Fife, James Fingal and Thomas Westberg.

Examples of sex and violence in video games are often trotted out as the root cause of many of society’s ills. Stepping away from the drama, are video games materially different than, say, movies?

Brian laments the fact that we don’t have many interesting examples of love and romance in video games. Jim’s been playing available interpretations as ...

Recorded on February 11th with Brian Fife, James Fingal and Thomas Westberg.

This is not the oft-promised indie episode - it is something much better! When thinking about what he liked about indie games, Jim realized the aspect that he wanted to discuss was the innovative design elements in many of his favorite games.

Innovative games often represent a thought experiment or a deliberate isolation or exaggeration of a specific ga...

Recorded on January 21st, 2013 with Brian Fife, James Fingal and Thomas Westberg.

Tom runs through a brief history of video game distribution, starting with arcade consoles and ending with digital distribution stores. A number of trends are identified: transition from physical (resellable) objects to software licenses, certification programs driven by the game distributors and the gradually lowering bar for distribution that now s...

Recorded on January 7th, 2013 with Brian Fife, James Fingal, and Thomas Westberg.

Jim, Brian and Tom start the new year with new audio equipment, a stack of new games to play and a summary of the top/memorable games of 2012.

When forced to summarize the year in gaming, the group talks about the development of conceptual / experimental indie games in the vein of Journey and Unfinished Swan, as well as a rash of kickstarter games...

Recorded on December 10th, 2012 with Brian Fife, James Fingal and Thomas Westberg.

Recently, MoMA announced their plans to show a collection of video games in 2013.

The challenges of collecting and showing video games are discussed, and Jim, Brian and Tom talk about thier reactions to the games that were selected - this list is very different from what we would expect to see on any serious gamer’s top ten list.

This will be t...

Recorded on November 21st, 2012 with Brian Fife, James Fingal and Thomas Westberg.

We’ve seen a dramatic shift in the way games are supported on the internet. Early on, gaming guides and magazines, as well as the occasional online FAQ or spoiler guide, were available, but now it’s almost a given that any game with a reasonable fan base has one or more dedicated websites around tricks, tips and strategies.

Two of the biggest chang...

Recorded on November 7th, 2012 with Brian Fife, James Fingal and Thomas Westberg.

Incremental improvements in game hardware (faster processing speed, more colors/pixels, etc.) are inevitable each generation, but generally don’t enable new game concepts. Tom covers a history of transformative hardware/platform features, including advanced sound, mass optical storage and network connectivity.

Jim reviews middleware platforms and t...

Recorded on October 11, 2012 with Brian Fife, James Fingal and Thomas Westberg.

Many games treat loot as another facet of levelling with different mechanics. Jim, Brian and Tom all have issues with the way that loot mechanics appear to be evolving in current games. Jim also has a principled objection to the way that loot reinforces materialism/consumerism. Many themes from Episode 5 - Grind are invoked.

Loot can be a great cause...

Recorded on September 29, 2012 with Brian Fife, James Fingal and Thomas Westberg.

In the post MMO-RPG world, we tend to make a lot of assumptions about what leveling is and how characters develop as they level, but there’s a lot of diversity in how leveling mechanics are managed. Jim, Brian and Tom discuss how leveling has evolved over the years.

Many games purport to have multiple leveling paths that result in differentiated ga...

Recorded on September 12, 2012 with Brian Fife, James Fingal and Thomas Westberg.

Fairness is slippery and it can be hard to find a definition that most players in a game share. Brian, Tom and Jim all agree that the perception of unfairness does tend to ruin fun in a game.

It can often be hard to differentiate between lack of balance and a gap in player skill. Often what a player might call unfair is just poor game design or bala...

Recorded on August 28, 2012 with Brian Fife, James Fingal and Thomas Westberg.

The group tries to avoid talking about Farmville-type games unsuccessfully, and eventually pulls the focus around to the new wave of F2P games, converted MMOs like DDO, free to play monetization models, the “whales” that support them, and the impact these models have on gameplay and experience.

Tom argues that future MMOs must be free to play, and unl...

Recorded on August 8th with Brian Fife, James Fingal, Thomas Westberg and the crickets in Brian’s basement.

Brian, Jim and Tom talk about grind. Grind is eventually defined as time or effort that isn’t enjoyable, that must be spent in a game reach an objective, gain an item, or an achievement.

Some may look fondly (in retrospect) on past labors that led to high achievement in a game - but often we look back at time we spend gri...

Recorded on July 25th with Brian Fife, James Fingal and Thomas Westberg.

Tom talks about early arcade games, starting with Spacewar! and ending with Donkey Kong. Jim describes his present-day arcade experiences.

Brian asks the group about game development, and they briefly discuss game development frameworks.

World of Tanks,
38 Studios - Boston Magazine,
Scott Jennings - Broken Toys,
Copernicus - MMO,
Todd McFarlane,
R.A....

Recorded on July 16th, 2012 with Brian Fife, James Fingal, and Thomas Westberg.

Tom, Brian and Jim talk about the Steam Summer Sale and how the Hunger games is similar to Special Ops: The Line.

Jim drove the main topic for discussion - Quality and Value in games. Is cost per hour of attention a valid way to talk about entertainment value? This doesn’t seem to be a factor with printed material, but it often comes up with video or...

Recorded on July 5th, 2012 with Brian Fife, James Fingal, and Thomas Westberg.

Story-driven games and degrees of freedom in games are covered. Is a choose your own adventure interactive story really a “game”? How about puzzle games that are heavily biased towards a cutscene-based story?

Is there a good way to classify or categorize games? Our hosts start to talk about this but do not come to any conclusions.

The way games deal ...

Recorded on June 26th, 2012 with Brian Fife, James Fingal, and Thomas Westberg.

Brian, Jim and Tom talk about beloved games and give some general background on their goals and interests regarding games. They each provide the following background info: