Really only finite possibilities?

Been reading 37signals recently - their design philosophy really is inspiring...

In one post, they talk about how readers warn them of websites that rip off their design, and upon a warning from 37Signals, they sometimes get a response to the affect of "how many different ways are there to design a web page or a web app?"

Whenever I run into designer’s block ... I turn to the world of wrist watches.

A wrist watch is a tiny canvas with something to keep that canvas tied to your wrist. It’s just a couple inches round or square or triangular. It has a fixed, common purpose: Tell time...

And yet somehow, with these physical and practical constraints, watch design flourishes. From analog to digital to a combination of the two, tens of thousands of designs are born. Different type, different proportions, different shapes, different perspectives, different indicators, different buttons, different bezels, etc. Fresh new designs hit the market all the time. Here are about a hundred different interpretations of the same question: “What time is it right now?”

I would think the same thing about how it's so difficult to innovate standard genres in games. How many FPS's can there really be after all? Then Team Fortress comes around... and Portal, what about Gunz? I also thought that all the genre's really have already been created (or that new genres would just be combinations of the existing ones) - but here comes physics based games like Armadillo Run.

I don't consider myself a creative person - just resourceful. I assume that I'm like most people in hoping to be on the edge of innovation.

Read: Article

Guaranteed Play Video Poker

I subscribed to "Southern Gaming" for two reasons
#1: I am really into probability (especially video poker)
#2: It was free at the time.

I admit, most of the time they just go into the recycling bin after I thumb through them, but every once and a while I stumble on some fun articles.

In this one, there was just a blurb about a new style of video poker: "Guaranteed Play(tm) video poker".

In one test version at a 25-cent denomination, a $20 ticket bought 100 guaranteed hands of Deuces Wild. Instead of starting with 80 credits on the meter, as in a regular 25-cent video poker, the meter starts at zero - that's the key to casinos being able to offer the guarantee. Bet, and the credit meter moves to minus-5. Hit four of a kind for 20 credits in this Deuces version, and the meter moves to plus-15.

At the end, if you have positive credits, you can cash out. If the meter is negative, you just walk away - you never pay more than your original buy-in, no matter how negative the credit meter gets.

So what are the potential winnings here? Let's say you break even every hand. At the end of the session, you walk away with the same amount of money as if you lost every hand - nothing... for a net loss of $20. So in order to actually make out, you have to not only stay in the black to get paid, but you need to be up MORE than the amount of your buy-in. How many people actually double their money in a casino?

To combat this problem, there has got to be some user-side benefits or else the system would fail. You'll get more hands than $20 would normally buy or much better odds.

So what about strategy? When you're playing with virtual money and you're in the hole anyway nearing the end of your session, you might as well go for the gold. A low pair with some face cards? You would save the face cards normally... but when you're -100, being -95 won't do you any good, so go for the four of a kind.
So what's going on here - why this over regular video poker?

Read: Article

Paradox of the Active User (RTFM)

People like features, and will pay more for it, but the traditional active user doesn't read the manual and just starts using the product. The result is an uninformed user that statistically took more time to accomplish his/her task than if they spent time reading the manual in the first place.

This interests me because it seems to be the exact reason why I feel games MUST have active tutorials. Then, if the game is deep enough, it's supplimented by a detailed instruction manual. Unfortunately I can't recall a game that's had a good tutorial and scenarios that assist with the learning curve.

You know, I've always had in my mind that there were a few indicators of when you've made it as a game developer:

1. Your product is (at least attempted) to be shared illegally. I'm not saying to leave out copy protection, I'm saying that it's good when people like your product so much that they go out of their way to get it


2. You've made it to the top of search engine results (without paying for it)


3. You have a faq and message board on gamefaqs

Now this makes me question that last one though. Should you really ever have questions frequently asked about your gameplay? (or anything for that matter?) If you think about it, you should have addressed all questions in-game... or at least in some easily accessible way.

Read: blog article, definition

Procedural Content from Introversion

Ah Introversion - indie development's poster child. For those that don't know, they're an independent, self publishing, award-winning game developer.

The article comes from Game Career Guide and talks about procedural content and how the industry should shift towards it. Procedural content is the act of generating content dynamically through functions. In their examples, their next game generates the layout of a city given certain arguments. Roads and building attributes are based on population density, districts, and ground elevation. Entire cities are created by functions. What would take thousands of man hours for artists and level designers now took a few weeks of programming.

However, this is nothing new. At E3 last year, this was Will Wright's big concept in Spore. Everything from lifeforms to galaxies are all procedural. .kkrieger was able to pack an fps into 96 kb with graphics comparable to current gen shooters.

They go on to point out that they are not just talking about static models, but animation, and textures. Back to spore, the animals you create must be able to walk in a believable fashion without programmers knowing what you'll develop.

Like they said, with development costs and computing on the rise, the best way to fill vast virtual worlds will be with functions - especially for indie developers with limited resources.

Read: article

Ads that don't want you to click

Short article - essentially it details pre-qualifying clickers (read: web surfers that click on your ad). Given that a business pays a banner hosting site by the click - the business is going to want to make sure the right person clicks.

Some ads should be designed to reduce response.... In order to qualify for a loan, the prospective business must accept all major credit cards and have been in operation for at least one year.

This ad does not mention these requirements and generated a 17 percent click-through rate (CTR):

Merchant Account Loans
Business Loans. Fast and easy.
Low rates. Quick approvals.

When we added the two requirements, and presented ad copy with qualifiers, response dropped dramatically -- to around a 10 percent CTR:

Merchant Account Loans
Must accept Visa/MC. Established
1 year. Fast/easy approval process.


...the conversion rate associated with the second ad, with pre-qualifiers, was significantly higher than the ... more generic ad. Not surprisingly, the overall return on investment (ROI) for the campaign improved dramatically.

Read: article

NOVA - Magnetic Storm

Magma in core produces magnetism (unknown why). There are ppl superheating/pressurizing metals attempting to observe.

Basically, the Earth is a liquid magnet - and liquids are just that .... liquidy. So the poles move around, and sometimes you'll have bursts of positive charge appearing in the negative side, etc. When enough bursts occur, the poles start to change strength and even flip. We can see evidence of this by looking through 3 things: cooling lava, cooling clay, and sailor's comparisons of true north. Sailors compare where the compass north is to an astronomical reading and have recorded it - and through history you can see changes. Cooling is seen because after the element is headed - the substance polarizes to the earth's magnetic pull. By knowing when pots are thrown, we can see the magnitude and direction of earth's magnetism. Similarly we can see lava in stages of it being cooled to note changes. There was even a period of time (long ago) where the polarity swapped in a matter of 6 days - you would SEE the compass needle change... if one existed...

So how does this effect us? Well the polarity generates a magnetic field that protects us from the sun's radiation - it reflects it to the north/south (Aurora Borealis) and back into space. The radiation could cause significant amounts of cancer, the loss of atmosphere, etc - in fact, this is what seemed to happen to Mars. It has no poles, but lava is polarized EXCEPT where two asteroids hit it and remelted the rock. Since that rock is not polarized, then there was no field when those asteroids hit.

So when? The magnitude of the poles have dropped dramatically - fastest it's been since civilization, and the rate is increasing. However, if there IS a swap, it's not expected for thousands of years.

Read: online details

Competing on the Basis of Speed

Concept of "fast companies":
Dell: through speed - significant cost advantage due to low cost infrastructure. They have cheap price per component not because they buy cheaper - they buy at same price of course, but cheaper surrounding infrastructure. (1:25)
Toyota: Brought Prius from concept to market in 15 months
Google: competes on speed in software dev area

Competing on basis of speed gives : 1) a significant competitive advantage, and 2) a large barrier to entry - companies need to catch up.

Things that kill speed:
complexity
3 faces of complexity

1. waste: anything that depletes resources/effort/space/money - keep it simple
2. Inconsistency: uneven, unbalanced, etc - make it flawless
3. overload: excessive or unreasonable burden - make it flow

1) waste
Keep common infrastructure
achitecture/convention/tools
keep simplifying the code via refactoring

a dev process that anticipates change will result in software that tolerates change

Toyota's design process:
"set based design" (9:45)
They have 10 engines and pick one before production - not use one and keep making changes.
Makes decision as late as possible

Make decisions reversible whenever possible
-when change creates complexity, refactor

Paused at 13:00... fascinating, but getting sleepy...

Watch: google video

History of the iPod

• Jobbs returns to Apple
• Jobbs says you can't ask the consumer what you want... but you can create an environment where everyone gets together and brainstorms until you say "that's it! that's what we'll do!"
• Decide to do the iPod
• Napster goes down, so need a new electronic way to obtain music
• Designs iTunes
• Same day of iTunes launch, announcement of 3rd gen (windows compatable)
• Sells 1 mil songs in 5 days, 200 mil by 2004
• Now Jobbs wants to expand the iPod line so that there's a size for everyone and for everyone's wallet - this blankets the market and makes it hard for competitors to get a niche
• In Oct 2005, they market the video iPod, something that Jobbs has always said would never happen - the consumer will never get the same feel of video when you watch it on a portable screen. Conspiracy theories state that Jobbs suggests this is bad all along to deter competitors.
• Apple now has 4 iPods at 4 pricepoints, so now there's no excuse not to go with iPod when choosing an mp3 player
• in 2005 - own 75% of US mp3 player market - 32 million iPods
  
• "the reason for such a large % is they stay ahead of competitors and stay unmatched in the market"
• In sept 2006, iTunes sells song # 1.5 bil, 3 mil per day, 5th largest music retailer in the US, bigger than Tower and Sam Goody.
• "80% of Microsoft employees who own mp3 players own iPods"
• Cultish following - noone else makes fake players/phones for other companies
• The iPod system is supposed to goto 1 bil $, making iPod the only device with a $1bil side business. An iPod owner spends $100s on accessories and iTunes - that only works with iPod - ppl won't jump ship after that investment.

Watch: google video