The theory and origins of LEVEL
Posted: 15 Oct 2007, 21:38
Note: This is my response to "The leveling curve."
Warning: This is a rant.
WHERE DID LEVELING COME FROM?
Let's look at LEVELING from a theoretical standpoint. Where did the term come from? From the olden days, games like Pac-man, space invaders, and super mario bros. would use level to keep track of how far one has progressed in the game. Generally this number would correspond to the number of the current map/level being completed.
I personally think a game that has leveling for skill is boring and is wrong. Why can't we do it like in the old days! Your level should be how far you have completed the game, story-wise or whatever--achievements.
BUT WHO SAID YOU EVEN NEED LEVELS? In the past, it was a way to make gameplay simplified for computer programmers to determine how opponents fared against eachother. LEVELS ARE AN ABSTRACT, ARBITRARY SIMPLIFICATION OF SKILL. THERE IS NO SOUND INHERENT LOGIC BEHIND THEM AS THEY APPLY TO CHARACTER STATS. (But maybe the player's skill, and not the avatar's.) Don't get it? Read on...
WHAT ABOUT SKILLS?
WHERE DID THE SKILL PROGRESSION CURVE COME FROM? Well, that's easy. Every time the brain/body engages in an activity, it learns--it remembers how to execute the activity with skill, better and better each time. Mental skills result in memorizing the commonly used facts, and having better reasoning abilities. Physical skills result in your body's muscle development, or agility, or dexterity. EVERY ACT HAS ITS SPECIFIC MENTAL AND PHYSICAL REQUIREMENTS. The body and mind adjust to those over time through repetition/practice until the plateau effect, where the body and mind have adjusted to their maximum capacity for the activity, and no further development is either possible or required for the body to engage in the activity optimally. But this activity must continue to be engaged in or the body starts adapting itself to the activities that it is more currently engaged in, and hence the capacity for the old activities may be partially replaced or lost. Note that these activites are specific -- tied mostly to a specific body/mind action, and only partly to the career/occupation itself.
EXAMPLE A:
Physical trainers know that to develop strong muscle, you don't just lift 20 pound weights your whole life. Eventually your muscle development plateaus, so you have to move on to bigger and heavier lifting, like 50 pounds. While lifting 50 pounds, lifting 20 pounds seems easy, like lifting a paper plate compared to a ball of lead. If one goes back to lifting 20 pounds, then the body adjusts its muscle development back to 20 pounds, and your muscles readjust, and eventually you are back to where you were (after a long time), lifting only 20 pounds with ease, and not 50. This is what we call becoming "rusty" at something.
EXAMPLE B:
A typer develops dexterity, and can better control his finger movements, and even though he can't play the piano, he will fare better than someone who doesn't have the dexterity of a good typer. Both skills use finger dexterity, so both skills somewhat compliment eachother, but only partially--some skill is specific to being a piano player--memorizing the positions of notes on the piano. Some skill is specific to typing--memorizing the position of keys on the keyboard (subconciously).
This is where games come in--we could do without levels.
EXAMPLE C:
Sword-fighting is a skill that is developed through sword-use and skill-teaching and practice, or repetition. While being a great sword-fighter will give you arm strength, it doesn't give you leg strength, and it doesn't increase your accuracy with the bow for the most part, although it does allow you to carry heavier bows and use strongly tightened bows with more shooting power. That's how a game might should work.
So what does this mean? Physical skills are specific to muscles. Dexterity is specific to reflexes. Intelligence is specific to thinking.
So why not have swordmanship and bowmanship be partly related (arm strength component) and partly unrelated(long-distance aiming abilities vs. short distance aiming abilites), so that one can have some flexibility in skill if one wants to do something related with their avatar. One's avatar should be able learn any skill through practice, so that being a good player only means doing and learning about it alot instead of leveling up alot. A master bowman will be defeated by an journeyman swordsman, or an apprentice magician, but will be undefeated at the bow.
We don't NEED "level"s. We need mental and physical development levels determining the current ability of the skill, with a factoring of skill-specific ability (since the mind/body adjusts to specific skills optimally. example: memorizing 3+4 = 7 vs. being good at addition in your head in general).
My preference is that the skill is in the player and not in his character or avatar. This is achieved through strategy in gaming (mental), and through action in gaming (hand-eye coordination, physical), but boring repitition only achieves long hours of getting good at: clicking the mouse, killing things as fast as you can, learning the game, but it doesn't actually increase the player's hand-eye coordination or motor development, except as it relates to the specific tasks mentioned. But how fun is dexterously clicking the mouse? And the only thing stat systems can do is develop the players reasoning skills, but once the stat system is figured out in the player's head, then there's nothing left for the player to really DO except to sit there, watching, clicking, until the avatar progresses. Fun games make the player develop skill, and not their avatar, whether it be mental (solving puzzles, creating an optimal character, strategically planning battles) or physical (hand-eye coordination like in Super Smash Bros., space invaders) or social (as in Mario Party, or guilds), it gets the players into it and not merely the avatars.
By putting the skill into the player, any player who has good hand-eye coordination or is very intelligent will automatically be half-good at some skills, but will still enjoy the game because it will develop their skills--it will engage THEM, and not their avatars.
Warning: This is a rant.
WHERE DID LEVELING COME FROM?
Let's look at LEVELING from a theoretical standpoint. Where did the term come from? From the olden days, games like Pac-man, space invaders, and super mario bros. would use level to keep track of how far one has progressed in the game. Generally this number would correspond to the number of the current map/level being completed.
I personally think a game that has leveling for skill is boring and is wrong. Why can't we do it like in the old days! Your level should be how far you have completed the game, story-wise or whatever--achievements.
BUT WHO SAID YOU EVEN NEED LEVELS? In the past, it was a way to make gameplay simplified for computer programmers to determine how opponents fared against eachother. LEVELS ARE AN ABSTRACT, ARBITRARY SIMPLIFICATION OF SKILL. THERE IS NO SOUND INHERENT LOGIC BEHIND THEM AS THEY APPLY TO CHARACTER STATS. (But maybe the player's skill, and not the avatar's.) Don't get it? Read on...
WHAT ABOUT SKILLS?
WHERE DID THE SKILL PROGRESSION CURVE COME FROM? Well, that's easy. Every time the brain/body engages in an activity, it learns--it remembers how to execute the activity with skill, better and better each time. Mental skills result in memorizing the commonly used facts, and having better reasoning abilities. Physical skills result in your body's muscle development, or agility, or dexterity. EVERY ACT HAS ITS SPECIFIC MENTAL AND PHYSICAL REQUIREMENTS. The body and mind adjust to those over time through repetition/practice until the plateau effect, where the body and mind have adjusted to their maximum capacity for the activity, and no further development is either possible or required for the body to engage in the activity optimally. But this activity must continue to be engaged in or the body starts adapting itself to the activities that it is more currently engaged in, and hence the capacity for the old activities may be partially replaced or lost. Note that these activites are specific -- tied mostly to a specific body/mind action, and only partly to the career/occupation itself.
EXAMPLE A:
Physical trainers know that to develop strong muscle, you don't just lift 20 pound weights your whole life. Eventually your muscle development plateaus, so you have to move on to bigger and heavier lifting, like 50 pounds. While lifting 50 pounds, lifting 20 pounds seems easy, like lifting a paper plate compared to a ball of lead. If one goes back to lifting 20 pounds, then the body adjusts its muscle development back to 20 pounds, and your muscles readjust, and eventually you are back to where you were (after a long time), lifting only 20 pounds with ease, and not 50. This is what we call becoming "rusty" at something.
EXAMPLE B:
A typer develops dexterity, and can better control his finger movements, and even though he can't play the piano, he will fare better than someone who doesn't have the dexterity of a good typer. Both skills use finger dexterity, so both skills somewhat compliment eachother, but only partially--some skill is specific to being a piano player--memorizing the positions of notes on the piano. Some skill is specific to typing--memorizing the position of keys on the keyboard (subconciously).
This is where games come in--we could do without levels.
EXAMPLE C:
Sword-fighting is a skill that is developed through sword-use and skill-teaching and practice, or repetition. While being a great sword-fighter will give you arm strength, it doesn't give you leg strength, and it doesn't increase your accuracy with the bow for the most part, although it does allow you to carry heavier bows and use strongly tightened bows with more shooting power. That's how a game might should work.
So what does this mean? Physical skills are specific to muscles. Dexterity is specific to reflexes. Intelligence is specific to thinking.
So why not have swordmanship and bowmanship be partly related (arm strength component) and partly unrelated(long-distance aiming abilities vs. short distance aiming abilites), so that one can have some flexibility in skill if one wants to do something related with their avatar. One's avatar should be able learn any skill through practice, so that being a good player only means doing and learning about it alot instead of leveling up alot. A master bowman will be defeated by an journeyman swordsman, or an apprentice magician, but will be undefeated at the bow.
We don't NEED "level"s. We need mental and physical development levels determining the current ability of the skill, with a factoring of skill-specific ability (since the mind/body adjusts to specific skills optimally. example: memorizing 3+4 = 7 vs. being good at addition in your head in general).
My preference is that the skill is in the player and not in his character or avatar. This is achieved through strategy in gaming (mental), and through action in gaming (hand-eye coordination, physical), but boring repitition only achieves long hours of getting good at: clicking the mouse, killing things as fast as you can, learning the game, but it doesn't actually increase the player's hand-eye coordination or motor development, except as it relates to the specific tasks mentioned. But how fun is dexterously clicking the mouse? And the only thing stat systems can do is develop the players reasoning skills, but once the stat system is figured out in the player's head, then there's nothing left for the player to really DO except to sit there, watching, clicking, until the avatar progresses. Fun games make the player develop skill, and not their avatar, whether it be mental (solving puzzles, creating an optimal character, strategically planning battles) or physical (hand-eye coordination like in Super Smash Bros., space invaders) or social (as in Mario Party, or guilds), it gets the players into it and not merely the avatars.
By putting the skill into the player, any player who has good hand-eye coordination or is very intelligent will automatically be half-good at some skills, but will still enjoy the game because it will develop their skills--it will engage THEM, and not their avatars.