Illusion of freedom: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 13:45, 10 August 2007

The player's sense of being able to do "anything" in a game, even though the range of actions is really much more limited.

Some techniques which contribute to the illusion of freedom include:

Influencing players to choose actions that the author wants them to chose.
Time limited situations (or at least a sense of a time limit), where the player does not have time to probe too deeply into the limits of the implementation.
Making the player too concerned with their immediate problems to be side tracked into other activities.
Softening the edges of the world (see Emily Short's article on geography - search for "At the Edge of the World").
Thorough implementation, including second level objects, a large number of conversation topics, multiple solutions to puzzles, and so on.

The Illusion of Freedom in the IF Gems review quotes collection (also available from the IF Archive).

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 * Influencing players to choose actions that the author wants them to chose.
-* Time limited situations (or at least a feeling of a time limit), where the playing does not have time to probe too deeply into the limits of the implementation.
+* Time limited situations (or at least a sense of a time limit), where the player does not have time to probe too deeply into the limits of the implementation.
 * Making the player too concerned with their immediate problems to be side tracked into other activities.
 * Softening the edges of the world (see [[Emily Short|Emily Short's]] article on [http://emshort.wordpress.com/writing-if/my-articles/geography geography] - search for "At the Edge of the World").