Soapbox: About the Industry

Mad Scientists and the Kilgallon Paradox

by Sandy Antunes
Jan 09,2004

Mad Scientists and the Kilgallon Paradox

Happy New Year!

This year's columns will be taking a different stance than usual. Instead of topical events, for which I am out of the loop, I am going to cover game theory, making saleable games, larp, and kids (in some vague order).

Specifically, we shall look at why most games suck. For this, we need to look at games from the outside, in order to improve them. We also need to look at gamers, and what they want.

I think many publishers love their own customers, but have at least a vague dislike of 'gamers', defined as "all those folks buying other people's products, but not mine."

This goes hand in hand with "I've written a great product that will be the next big thing", which, when it fails, always means "those morons didn't get my genius!"

Fortunately, as an accredited mad scientist, I'm trained to recognize such behavior. The fools, I'll teach them all!

Actually, I'm being pretty serious with the 'mad scientist' comparison.

I think the lack of market studies and focus groups (or at least blind playtesting, for gosh sakes) means a lot of creators are creating from their gut, from their heart. All truly great things come from there, but, umm... how to put this, so does a lot of crap. Good writers have editors to keep them focused and relevant, but good publishers have only 'the market'. And unlike editing, the market is purely pass/fail.

It's easier to blame the customers for this industry, than ourselves. What the "market" really need to provide to "gamers" is good games. In order to do that, we have to discard the usual game creation steps:

1. I have a cool idea
2. It's like _X_, only with _A_
3. My players like this sort of thing, so it must be good!

When you run a good game, it's because you're good at the run-time experience. Good at GMing, good at handling a game event. But a good game as a product, standing on its own, requires a certain rigour in its creation. It has to be easy, yet bulletproof. It has to appeal to everyone, yet challenge them. It has to be familiar, yet novel.

We'll start with the Kilgallon Paradox. Stated succinctly, it says:

RPGs emphasize combat. But if the game has problem-solving, I'm the best problem solver I know. Therefore, problem-solving isn't roleplay. So why have a non-combat character, since any non-combat details are just schtick.

The Kilgallon Paradox goes a long way towards explaining why so many RPGs dedicate the bulk of their rules towards combat. The corrolary is that players then think, "if there's so many rules about combat, I guess that's what is most important."

Net result: games focus on combat, and thus attract a specific audience: people who want fantasy fighting.

Now, one of my recent works was basically a "sneaker" (non-combat mystery) adventure, set in Redhurst Academy of Magic. From this, our gaming group springboarded into "Redhurst: CSI" as a campaign idea.

From a game theory point of view, this was possible only because Redhurst contains the tools to make combat difficult, if not impossible. If combat is not an option, suddenly players have to do "other stuff". And we've had fun.

But we still haven't really escaped the Kilgallon Paradox. Suddenly, the players are thinking and interacting, but they're solving puzzles as, well, players. They aren't interacting with the environment in a character-based sense, rather, they are receiving character input, solving things as players, then feeding that back to their characters.

Here's an (poor) example of the difference between character-based and player-based problem solving.

Player-based: Hmm... the orcs are attacking in a line, I should use burning hands to slow them, so the rangers can leisurely shoot them full of arrows.

Character-based: Hmm... the orcs are attacking but I'm a first level magic user with no combat experience and low wisdom, so I should probably just run away.

Well, gee, the last one is "realistic", but not terribly fun. And "the most fun way to play the game should always be the most rewarding" (Larry DeMar, Game Developer, Nov 2003). So we are suddenly left with 2 problems. Can we resolve the Kilgallon Paradox? And should we, or would it change what we think of as an RPG?

Until next month,
Sandy