{"id":2978,"date":"2010-06-21T13:07:37","date_gmt":"2010-06-21T17:07:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/aderack.com\/journal\/?p=2978"},"modified":"2021-03-27T17:15:40","modified_gmt":"2021-03-27T21:15:40","slug":"2978","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/aderack.com\/journal\/2010\/06\/2978\/","title":{"rendered":"Phantom Fingers: The Series – Part Three: Focused Fire"},"content":{"rendered":"

by [redacted]<\/b><\/p>\n

What can I say about Space Invaders<\/em> that you don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t already know? Not a lot, I reckon, so I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m not going to go into too much depth on the facts. If you need more, there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s the Internet. Rather, I mean to frame the available information within the discussion we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve been having, with an aim to highlighting its greater relevance.<\/p>\n

You will recall we talked about Pong<\/em>, and the easy introduction it provided into that alien space on the other side of the TV screen. Although there wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t much meaning to be had, the passive control the game provided over that one packet of information, bouncing around its tiny gameworld according to discernible laws acting on their own, allowed the player to mentally map out the game\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s reality.<\/p>\n

There was a whole new, bottled system of cause and effect for the player\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s mind to lock into and understand. And as minimally involving as the laws and interface were, they were novel and fascinating, and simple to digest — to the extent that Pong<\/em> became a cultural sensation.<\/p>\n

Then, as we discussed, four years later, Breakout<\/em> came along and reframed Pong <\/em>as a solitary experience, as a complex space, and as a distinct narrative. Now the player\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s focus was entirely on the gameworld, rather than the gameworld acting as a catalyst for two players to entertain each other. In turn, the gameworld had more to focus on.<\/p>\n

The player\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s every action — as indirect as the interface remained — resulted in a tangible effect, or consequence, within the world. A tile would break, the board would be a little more open, and the surfaces to bounce off of would be a little different. The interaction was suddenly more meaningful, at least within the narrow scope provided. And then when the board was clear, twice over, the game was over. There was a distinct goal to achieve, entirely within the parameters of the game\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s bottle universe.<\/p>\n

Well, all those changes were significant. Different designers took away different lessons by how they balanced those changes in their heads, and ran off to extrapolate further — leading us to at least two distinct schools of game design and a new focus on a single player\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s causal relationship with the gameworld, as compared to videogames as a mere game or social tool.<\/p>\n

For now let\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s jump the Pacific, and ride the narrative train for a while.<\/p>\n

( Continue reading at Game Set Watch<\/a> )<\/b><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by [redacted] What can I say about Space Invaders that you don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t already know? Not a lot, I reckon, so I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m not going to go into too much depth on the facts. If you need more, there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s the Internet. Rather, I mean to frame the available information within the discussion we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve been having, with an […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ocean_post_layout":"","ocean_both_sidebars_style":"","ocean_both_sidebars_content_width":0,"ocean_both_sidebars_sidebars_width":0,"ocean_sidebar":"0","ocean_second_sidebar":"0","ocean_disable_margins":"enable","ocean_add_body_class":"","ocean_shortcode_before_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_after_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_before_header":"","ocean_shortcode_after_header":"","ocean_has_shortcode":"","ocean_shortcode_after_title":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_bottom":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_bottom":"","ocean_display_top_bar":"default","ocean_display_header":"default","ocean_header_style":"","ocean_center_header_left_menu":"0","ocean_custom_header_template":"0","ocean_custom_logo":0,"ocean_custom_retina_logo":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_height":0,"ocean_header_custom_menu":"0","ocean_menu_typo_font_family":"0","ocean_menu_typo_font_subset":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_size":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_unit":"px","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_line_height":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_unit":"","ocean_menu_typo_spacing":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_unit":"","ocean_menu_link_color":"","ocean_menu_link_color_hover":"","ocean_menu_link_color_active":"","ocean_menu_link_background":"","ocean_menu_link_hover_background":"","ocean_menu_link_active_background":"","ocean_menu_social_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_links_color":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_color":"","ocean_disable_title":"default","ocean_disable_heading":"default","ocean_post_title":"","ocean_post_subheading":"","ocean_post_title_style":"","ocean_post_title_background_color":"","ocean_post_title_background":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_image_position":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_attachment":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_repeat":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_size":"","ocean_post_title_height":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay":0.5,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay_color":"","ocean_disable_breadcrumbs":"default","ocean_breadcrumbs_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_separator_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_hover_color":"","ocean_display_footer_widgets":"default","ocean_display_footer_bottom":"default","ocean_custom_footer_template":"0","ocean_post_oembed":"","ocean_post_self_hosted_media":"","ocean_post_video_embed":"","ocean_link_format":"","ocean_link_format_target":"self","ocean_quote_format":"","ocean_quote_format_link":"post","ocean_gallery_link_images":"off","ocean_gallery_id":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[179,40,879,722,27],"class_list":["post-2978","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-columns","tag-articles","tag-game-history","tag-gamesetwatch","tag-space-invaders","tag-videogames","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/aderack.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2978","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/aderack.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/aderack.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aderack.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aderack.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2978"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/aderack.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2978\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7966,"href":"https:\/\/aderack.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2978\/revisions\/7966"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/aderack.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2978"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aderack.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2978"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aderack.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2978"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}