A Green Mushroom

Games have goals.  Save that princess, kill ten rats , level up, defeat evil.  We all know and accept that these goals are set for us by the game developers. We take it for granted that the goals will be presented to us and we will try our best to accomplish them. But trust me, there is another way. Look at the success of Minecraft : a game with no goals.  We're given a tool set and told to have fun.  It's like being given a stuffed giraffe as a kid.  We can make up epic adventures for the giraffe to go on.  He can explore his environment and interact with other toys.  He can befriend a tiny tiny elephant or become bitter rivals with a cake.  Or maybe you'll just choose to chew on his head (like my daughter).  It's all up to us and our imagination.  We are given a toy and what we do with it is up to us.   Delicious choice. How many games like that are out there?  Not many at all.  Minecraft is the only one that rea...

I just realized how often a game drags me through a long and boring tutorial before getting into the action.  After renting so many Gamefly games lately and playing through at least their first hour I've determined that I hate introductions and tutorials in most games.  Developers, you need to get better at showing the player why we should love your game within the first few minutes. This is something that AAA developers can learn from flash and indie games .  You only have a few minutes to grab my attention.  After that I'm not going to play your game if I'm bored.  Don't waste time setting up an epic story.  Don't save interesting gameplay until later.  Don't limit me to an extremely linear tutorial.  Give me the game and let me test out the fun in it. In flash games I'm immediately thrown into the action.  I can figure out if I like a game within seconds.  With many console games I have to sit through the opening credits, openi...