[[_Anotacions]] tags:: #marc_teoric #Game #Game_Design # Bartle1996. Player types ## Anotacions [[Bartle1996]] "i) Achievement within the game context. Players give themselves game-related goals, and vigorously set out to achieve them. This usually means accumulating and disposing of large quantities of high-value treasure, or" ([Bartle 1996:20](zotero://open-pdf/library/items/WUL2WQ4A?page=2)) "cutting a swathe through hordes of mobiles (ie. monsters built in to the virtual world)." ([Bartle 1996:21](zotero://open-pdf/library/items/WUL2WQ4A?page=3)) "ii) Exploration of the game. Players try to find out as much as they can about the virtual world. Although initially this means mapping its topology (ie. exploring the MUD's breadth), later it advances to experimentation with its physics (ie. exploring the MUD's depth)." ([Bartle 1996:21](zotero://open-pdf/library/items/WUL2WQ4A?page=3)) "iii) Socialising with others. Players use the game's communicative facilities, and apply the role-playing that these engender, as a context in which to converse (and otherwise interact) with their fellow players." ([Bartle 1996:21](zotero://open-pdf/library/items/WUL2WQ4A?page=3)) "iv) Imposition upon others. Players use the tools provided by the game to cause distress to (or, in rare circumstances, to help) other players. Where permitted, this usually involves acquiring some weapon and applying it enthusiastically to the persona of another player in the game world." ([Bartle 1996:21](zotero://open-pdf/library/items/WUL2WQ4A?page=3)) "Consider the following abstract graph: ACTING Killers | Achievers | | | | | PLAYERS -------------------+------------------- WORLD | | | | | Socialisers | Explorers INTERACTING" ([Bartle 1996:24](zotero://open-pdf/library/items/WUL2WQ4A?page=6)) "The axes of the graph represent the source of players' interest in a MUD. The x-axis goes from an emphasis on players (left) to an emphasis on the environment (right); the y-axis goes from acting with (bottom) to acting on (top). The four extreme corners of the graph show the four typical playing preferences associated with each quadrant." ([Bartle 1996:24](zotero://open-pdf/library/items/WUL2WQ4A?page=6)) "i) Achievers are interested in doing things to the game, ie. in ACTING on the WORLD. It's the fact that the game environment is a fully-fledged world in which they can immerse themselves that they find compelling; its being shared with other people merely adds a little authenticity, and perhaps a competitive element. The point of playing is to master the game, and make it do what you want it to do; there's nothing intrinsically worthwhile in rooting out irrelevant details that will never be of use, or in idling away your life with gossip. Achievers are proud of their formal status in the game's built-in level hierarchy, and of how short a time they took to reach it." ([Bartle 1996:24](zotero://open-pdf/library/items/WUL2WQ4A?page=6)) "ii) Explorers are interested in having the game surprise them, ie. in INTERACTING with the WORLD. It's the sense of wonder which the virtual world imbues that they crave for; other players add depth to the game, but they aren't essential components of it, except perhaps as sources of new areas to visit. Scoring points all the time is a worthless occupation, because it defies the very open-endedness that makes a world live and breathe. Most accomplished explorers could easily rack up sufficient points to reach the top, but such one-dimensional behaviour is the sign of a limited intellect. Explorers are proud of their knowledge of the game's finer points, especially if new players treat them as founts of all knowledge." ([Bartle 1996:24](zotero://open-pdf/library/items/WUL2WQ4A?page=6)) "iii) Socialisers are interested in INTERACTING with other PLAYERS. This usually means talking, but it can extend to more exotic behaviour. Finding out about people and getting to know them is far more worthy than treating them as fodder to be bossed around. The game world is just a setting; it's the characters that make it so compelling." ([Bartle 1996:24](zotero://open-pdf/library/items/WUL2WQ4A?page=6)) "Socialisers are proud of their friendships, their contacts and their influence." ([Bartle 1996:25](zotero://open-pdf/library/items/WUL2WQ4A?page=7)) "iv) Killers are interested in doing things to people, ie. in ACTING on other PLAYERS. Normally, this is not with the consent of these "other players" (even if, objectively, the interference in their play might appear "helpful"), but killers don't care; they wish only to demonstrate their superiority over fellow humans, preferably in a world which serves to legitimise actions that could mean imprisonment in real life. Accumulated knowledge is useless unless it can be applied; even when it is applied, there's no fun unless it can affect a real person instead of an emotionless, computerised entity. Killers are proud of their reputation and of their oft-practiced fighting skills." ([Bartle 1996:25](zotero://open-pdf/library/items/WUL2WQ4A?page=7)) "PLAYERS Putting the emphasis on players rather than the game is easy - you just provide the system with lots of communication commands and precious little else. The more the scales are tipped towards players, though, the less of a MUD you have and the more of a CB-style chatline. Beyond a certain point, the game can't provide a context for communication, and it ceases to be a viable virtual world: it's just a comms channel for the real world. At this stage, when all sense of elsewhere-presence is lost, you no longer have a MUD." ([Bartle 1996:26](zotero://open-pdf/library/items/WUL2WQ4A?page=8)) "WORLD Tilting the game towards the world rather than its inhabitants is also easy: you simply make it so big and awkward to traverse that no-one ever meets anyone in it; alternatively, you can ensure that if they do meet up, then there are very few ways in which they an interact. Although this can result in some nice simulations, there's a loss of motivation implicit within it: anyone can rack up points given time, but there's not the same sense of achievement as when it's done under pressure from competing players. And what use is creating beautifullycrafted areas anyway, if you can't show them to people? Perhaps if computer-run personae had more AI a MUD could go further in this direction (Mauldin, 1994), but it couldn't (yet) go all the way (as authors of single-player games have found (Caspian-Kaufman, 1995)). Sometimes, you just do want to tell people real-world things - you have a new baby, or a new job, or your cat has died. If there's no-one to tell, or no way to tell them, you don't have a MUD." ([Bartle 1996:26](zotero://open-pdf/library/items/WUL2WQ4A?page=8)) "INTERACTING Putting the emphasis on interaction rather than action can also go a long way. Restricting the freedom of players to choose different courses of action is the mechanism for implementing it, so they can only follow a narrow or predetermined development path. Essentially, it's MUD-as-theatre: you sit there being entertained, but not actually participating much. You may feel like you're in a world, but it's one in which you're paralysed. If the bias is only slight, it can make a MUD more "nannyish", which newcomers seem to enjoy, but pushing it all the way turns it into a radio set. Knowledge may be intrinsically interesting (ie. trivia), but" ([Bartle 1996:26](zotero://open-pdf/library/items/WUL2WQ4A?page=8)) "it's meaningless unless it can be applied. If players can't play, it's not a MUD" ([Bartle 1996:27](zotero://open-pdf/library/items/WUL2WQ4A?page=9)) "ACTING If the graph is redrawn to favour doing-to over doing-with, the game quickly becomes boring. Tasks are executed repeatedly, by rote. There's always monotony, never anything new, or, if these is something new, it's of the "man versus random number generator" variety. People do need to be able to put into practice what they've learned, but they also need to be able to learn it in the first place! Unless the one leads to the other, it's only a matter of time before patience is exhausted and the players give up. Without depth, you have no MUD. From the above list of ways to tilt the interest graph, a set of strategems can be composed to help MUD administrators shift the focus of their games in whatever particular direction they choose. Some of these strategems are simply a question of management: if you don't tell people what communication commands there are, for example, people will be less likely to use them all. Although such approaches are good for small shifts in the way a MUD is played, the more powerful and absolute method is to consider programming changes (programming being the "nature" of a MUD, and administration being the "nurture")." ([Bartle 1996:27](zotero://open-pdf/library/items/WUL2WQ4A?page=9))