About this series: Storms on Cloud Nine is a column about the construction of
online games with a focus on mechanics. The author, Scott Holliday, is
currently working on the upcoming Skotos World "Orphan Crown". He
likes games such as paper-rock-scissors and can sometimes win at
tic-tac-toe.
Storms on Cloud 9 Column ...
- Makers of Dusk and Dawn - #44: The past and future of player-created content.
- Traffic and Pipes - #43: Starting a MMOG with a floorplan and letting players figure out the rest.
- Death and Taxes - #42: Using game systems to reduce out-of-band trading.
- Archives and Information - #41: Using credentials in the next generation of MMORPGs.
- Fortune Telling - #40: Looking at the present and future of online property & currency exchanges.
- Consequences and Death - #39: Death, or the lack thereof, in online games.
- What Went Wrong - #38: A discussion of one Skotos 7 game and where it went wrong.
- Filling the Sandbox - #37: How to fill a game with content. The answer is players.
- Cliché Practicality - #36: Why do all the popular MMORPGs include elves, scantily clad women, and rats?
- Order and Planning - #35: Planning as the foundation of any online game design.
- The Wheel - #34: Programming games: when to reinvent the wheel ... and when not to.
- Endurance - #33: How the Roguelike games have survived the test of time: a discussion of virtues.
- Captive Audience - #32: Take their eyes and don't give them back. (How to hold on to your gaming audience.)
- Depreciation of Character - #31: A fate worse than death in MORPGs.
- Law and Order - #30: A discussion of PKers and Grief Players in online games.
- Splinter Bonding - #29: Solutions for splintering your online player base.
- Keeping it Together - #28: How your community can divide itself in a MMOG.
- Tantalizing Choices - #27: How balanced rewards can overcome mathematics.
- Simple Arithmetic - #26: How game complexity in RPGs almost always involves mathematics.
- Apt Rewards - #25: How to match multiple definitions of success.
- Challenge and Reward - #24: Choosing challenges for online games.
- Case for Simplicity? - #23: What complexity actually makes games better?
- A Case for Complexity? - #22: A player suggests problems with MMOG play.
- Choice or Lack Thereof - #21: Multiple paths to victory or unnecessary content?
- Literally, Your Two Cents - #20: How big must a MMORPG be to work?
- The Competition - #19: What's needed to make the next generation of MMORPGs successful?
- Propagation - #18: Computer-generated content, from Wumpus onward.
- Fishhooks and Firewood - #17: Getting players hooked, starting with character creation.
- Cooking a MMOG - #16: Outlining the essentials of MMOG design.
- The Odds, Part Two - #15: Various systems for dice in games.
- The Odds, Part One - #14: Defining action-resolution systems.
- Relevance - #13: Do your players' actions really matter? In a MMOG, probably not.
- Creativity - #12: The "Nothing Ever Happens" problem in MMOGs.
- Population - #11: Building to accomodate your expected community size.
- Balance - #10: How to convince players to create balanced characters.
- The Secret Police - #9: Cheating in online games and how to discourage it.
- Actors and Reactors - #8: What is RP and how to motivate it.
- The Puzzle Enigma - #7: Player-generated content, computer-generated content, and random content.
- Evil and Wickedness - #6: Designing interesting CNPCs.
- The Casual Cow - #5: Five ways to attract more casual players.
- On the Online Line - #4: The problem of MMOGs that play like single-player games.
- Alternate Winning Conditions - #3: How online games allow each player to pursue their own goal.
- The Rock Test - #2: Does your game system fly better than a rock?
- Hello from Cloud 9 - #1: An introduction to Orphan Crown.
Top 20 Storms on Cloud 9 Articles ...
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