A unique blog about game design and development, by a 40yo professional game sculptor.

I've been doing a lot of thinking and fiddling about systems games.  However, there's nothing like a good discussion with peers to break me out into exciting territory.  So it was with my phone conversation with Bruce today.

We discussed how systems games seem to be (at root) little people games, how the basic mechanic is little people pathing, moving, getting, and dropping.  I pointed out that Rollercoaster Tycoon is a systems game with little people, and they do these four things, but that game also has a creativity subgame, where you build kenetic sculptures (rollercoasters) that interact with the little people mechanic.  I then pointed out how Mike identified this; he talked about how several loosely-coupled game systems, operating concurrently, could greatly expand the "answer space" of the game.  Bruce pointed out that RTycoon also had a landscaping creativity subgame, and he found it tremendously compelling.

Then I started talking about time dilation, that aspect of fun games that makes you look up and notice that time seems to pass quicker ("Wow, I played for 4 hours? I need to get some sleep!!").  Dwarf Fortress has it, as does many systems games, and I was hoping to find an ur-mechanic that  encapsulated time dilation.  Bruce and I discussed it, and I pointed out that the time dilation I've experienced seems to associate with the micro-level of the game, not the macro-level.  It's the fiddly bits, not the level goals, that cause time dilation.

Then I hit upon a theory!  Time dilation (caused by a systems game) is not about building the system, but about optimizing the system.  It's the tweaking, not the building.  In other words,  time dilation doesn't kick in until a system is up and running, and you're trying to expand/adjust that system.  I'm eager to test this theory; a fishing fleet simulator might be just the ticket.

Getting back to the loosely coupled systems idea, Bruce pointed out different games that use it.  This led me to the tentative conclusion that systems games can possibly integrate almost any sort of sub-game, as long as 1) it runs concurrently, and 2) somehow links with and effects other sub-games.  I immediately thought of a top-scrolling shooter, where your ship is powered by little hamsters running to and fro.