Interview with Kongregate’s Jim Greer and Me
Here's an interview on gamasutra with Jim Greer (co-founder of Kongregate.com) and myself. As usual, I will surprise and amaze you with an unusual level of honesty about what's really going on. There are cheers and jeers and some of my methods revealed. A choice quote from Jim mentions my "genius for balancing" and the interviewer himself refers to me as "renowned game designer and balancer, David Sirlin." Ha.
Now that that's out of my system, check out Kongregate.com. Jim and his crew are highly intelligent, highly motivated, and foster an environment where everyone contributes ideas and the best ones rise to the top. Kongregate is worth your look. The site-wide metagame called Kongai is where I come in, and I hope that's worth your look too, once it's out of beta.
--Sirlin
April 30th, 2008 at 12:44 pm
[…] the2bears.com wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptInterview with Kongregate’s Jim Greer and Me April 30th, 2008 Here’s an interview on gamasutra with Jim Greer (co-founder of Kongregate.com) and myself. As usual, I will surprise and amaze you with an unusual level of honesty about what’s really going on. There are cheers and jeers and some of my methods revealed. A choice quote from Jim mentions my “genius for balancing” and the interviewer himself refers to me as “renowned game designer and balancer, David Sirlin.” Ha. Now that that’s out […]
April 30th, 2008 at 1:11 pm
Man, how long have you been working on Yomi?
April 30th, 2008 at 1:20 pm
“Kongregate’s metagame, by its very nature, already has one layer between the players and the game. It’s a harmless one though, because all you have to do is play various games on Kongregate.com to earn the cards, and that’s fun in itself. I’d even say it ads another layer of fun to all those games.”
Argh! It is not harmless. Playing various games on Kongregate.com has proven to be very not fun. It is in fact an extra layer of annoyance. The nice thing about being able to buy cards in Magic is that it doesn’t waste your time. (Well, relatively little of it.)
This sounds like a great game. I would be very happy if I could pay some cash up front and be given all the cards. If I have to play move-the-glowing-ball-into-the-target, or dull-ff-battle-clone every week to make sure I’m on equal footing with everyone else, I probably won’t play.
Maybe I’m not in the target market for the game? Perhaps Kongregate is only interested in the intersection of those who like this type of game and those who have the time for or enjoy busywork. That would make me sad.
April 30th, 2008 at 2:18 pm
There will be other ways to gain the cards if you find that way annoying. That’s being actively worked on right now.
April 30th, 2008 at 2:50 pm
mattvonb,
Relax, I’m on it.
After playing many games throughout my life, including:
• Diablo 2 competitively for 4 years
• Guild Wars for 4 years (eh, don’t get me started on Guild Wars)
… while actively researching the ideas (and people behind the ideas) in both games I’ve played and games I haven’t played (I call it “effortful gameplay”), and working almost full-time for the last 2 years working on on the topic of “maximising human potential”, I feel I’m one of few people who truly understands this topic and what can be done about it (suffice to say “this topic” has a lot more to do with psychology than it does “doing what is effective in games”).
(People will probably see that last paragraph—or even this comment—as arrogant or something, but when you can get a job done, and done well, I don’t think you should try to diminish your ability with modesty. I find most people use modesty as an excuse to be subpar. Not good if you like effectiveness. Plus, I like writing this way and grossly exaggerating my ability because it amuses me, heh.)
I understand your perspective, and as it relates to the topic of card unlocks, I understand almost every other perspective, too (not kidding; it’s possible if you parallel concepts from real-life to games. The amount of people I know who can do this—or, at least, “do” do this—I can count on two hands. Wave to Sirlin, ’cause he’s one of them).
I’ve already started writing a post about the exact topic you mention—card unlocks—and will be posting it soon in Sirlin’s forum.
What you guys can do then is get behind the idea and show your support. While the ideas I’ll put forward make sense, it’s likely Kongregate don’t share my perspective, and will see less sense in them.
It’s likely Kongregate have some other “business” perspective, which, while good, usually has tons of limiting thinking in it based on fear and a focus on survival and security. To throw out some baseless statistics, probably about 80% of business thinking is sound, but you can ditch the limiting, disempowering 20% that holds you back.
— Bruce
April 30th, 2008 at 9:09 pm
Nice article. Makes me glad I’m in the beta and able to play around with this excellent system.
It’s kinda funny. When I play Smash Brothers Melee, I go into most matches knowing with 99% certainty whether the outcome will be a win or a loss based on knowing if the opponent is an elite player or if he’s someone I never heard of. An elite player will almost always rip me apart. Someone I’ve never heard of is almost always someone either new to the game or someone that is good but not great, the former of which is an easy win and the latter of which my strategy is almost tailor made to defeat. Only against that small group in the middle do I feel I am “really” playing the game.
And yet with kongai, it feels exciting EVERY match. Even when I’m playing someone with a 0-2 record, and helping them through the interface (its amazing how few of the new players realize you can see your opponent’s moves) and pointing out when they had a vastly superior option (intercept instead of rest with a 80+ energy long range ashi), there’s the element of “if they guess right, they’re going to beat me.” And the same goes the other way, if I guess properly, it doesn’t matter if I’m fighting someone who’s 200-50, I have a shot. Great game Sirlin, I just hope you can finish working out the kinks in it :).
April 30th, 2008 at 11:09 pm
There will be other ways to gain the cards if you find that way annoying. That’s being actively worked on right now.
Thank you! I was looking forward to this but the only time I’ve had to play the flash games where I could earn badges was during times where certain firewalls / network configurations kept me from accessing Kongregate’s chat and reward system. =)
I’m glad I won’t have to go back and re-beat / re-win all those games I never got badges for.
So if there is an alternative method, what would that be? Wouldn’t it contradict the idea of having different cards based on achivement?
May 1st, 2008 at 12:25 am
I find your discussion of bad cards to be very interesting. On the one hand, you certainly have some good points. However, I would like to direct you to a Mark Rosewater(current head guy on mtg) article on why they feel it is important to print bad cards. I’m not saying your wrong, but you might be interested to hear the points he makes.
http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=mtgcom/daily/mr185
Full disclosure: I do think it is important to make every strategy viable, and agree with most of your points.
May 1st, 2008 at 2:07 am
Sirlin (and many of us around here) are quite familiar with Mark’s reasoning behind bad cards. Most of those points are irrelevant and/or wrong, and are simply apologetic to players who actually play the game (as opposed to learning the game or collecting) - $300 for one tournament-worthy deck is bullshit.
May 1st, 2008 at 2:33 am
Dylan, I am well aware of what Mark Rosewater said and have specifically referenced it many times now, in writing. As stated in the interview, I fully understand his points, I think he’s a great designer, I think he has arguably the greatest designed game ever on his hands, and on this particular point, I disagree with him.
May 1st, 2008 at 6:10 am
I haven’t visited the forums here for a long time, but when I read the mention of Pollo in interview, it was like a little jolt from the past. I didn’t realize that you two had a torrid love affair afterwards. ;-)
But seriously, excellent interview! I really appreciated the insight into designing Kongai. The game design seems simple, but purposeful and functional at the same time. Purposely omitting certain features and complexities to keep the game accessible will pay dividends.
May 1st, 2008 at 6:18 am
Hmm, I really wanna try this game but I’m a little bit scared at the same time. Increasing the importance of Yomi in a card game is good, but is it going to be so good that there will be no more room for the application of a well planned strategy?
I’ll see for myself when I put my hands on this… but I have confidence in you Sirlin.
May 1st, 2008 at 7:11 am
In Magic, there are definately cards that are bad, and don’t need to be printed. However, I would say nearly 80% of the cards are playable under Limited. I know you hate the format Sirlin, but there is quite a large audience for it, so those cards that are bad for constructed are NECESSARY for Limited to function well. Note that it works both ways, there are MANY cards that are excellent for Construted yet horrible for Limited, so both types of players suffer from “useless cards”.
I guess it’s sort of a necessary evil to have one game support 2 drastically different formats. I’d like to hear your solution to support both Limited and Construted within one product?
May 1st, 2008 at 7:43 am
Tim, good point. If I were designing Magic, I’d probably have to concede the necessary evil on both sides, as you explained. Both sides will have cards that are good for their format, but not good for the other format. It’s unfortunate. It’s almost like the game needs separate sets to reduce the extreme annoyance, but maybe the answer is just “oh well, that’s how it is.” I should point out that there are plenty of terrible cards that can’t be explained away because of limited, though.
I’m not designing Magic, though, so my actual solution is to not support limited. Constructed decks have far more variety (you can make them highly focused and extreme, analogous to Zangief vs Dhalsim as opposed to Ken vs slightly different Ken). Constructed decks allow you to get into the game faster, especially when you offer excellently crafted constructed decks right out of the box, which Magic doesn’t. Selling decks in this way does not prevent deckbuilders from coming up with their own unique designs, either. Getting rid of limited allows the whole game to be more focused and less full of trash cards. It’s a win in ever possible way except for two things: 1) “but I like limited” and 2) money. If you like limited, I invite you to keep playing MTG. Regarding money, there are more important reasons to make a game than extracting maximum rip-off from the players and, incidentally, static games that can sell forever like Scrabble and Monopoly do just fine.
May 1st, 2008 at 9:00 am
That’s a reasonable answer. I would agree that Limited play is in general less complex, less interesting and less time consuming, which is actually a plus for me. For example, Jon Finkel (for whom money is no object) Prefers the Limited Pro Tours BECASUE he doens’t have to spend tons of time perfecting a deck, testing matchups and analyzing cards. The basic skills that he’s already mastered generally always work in Limited, as he proved by winning the last pro tour after being away from the game for a while.
Limited does also have the sort of “excitement” factor of Drafting, where you go in not knowing what deck you can build or what cards are avaliable. The whole drafting process is almost a game unto itself. Though it sounds like for you, this is the negative.
Basically there is a lot less time invested in Limited, but it still takes skill to win, which I imagine is attractive to a lot of people.
Honestly I agree with you, that the game is too expensive and is in general set up to extract money from users. A Flat fee to access to all cards (online or in paper) Would allow Construted players full flexiblity, and limited fans could just shuffle up cards randomly.
Honestly a Flat Fee could make more money if priced right. Right now I would guesstimate that a FEW people are spending a lot of money, whereas the game could probably benefit from having MANY people spend few dollars.
That however would be a huge risk that I doubt Wizards/Hasbro would be willing to take.
May 1st, 2008 at 1:09 pm
When I first looked at the rules to Kongai, I was immediately reminded of the battle system to Pokemon (the GameBoy games, not the card game), and thought that it may have inspired this game. Now, upon seeing that you’ve made many Pokemon references in that interview, I know it to be true. I cannot stand turn-based JRPG battle systems, but the Pokemon games are the only ones of that genre that can hold my attention due to their deep battle systems. Good job on taking that and attempting to improve on it.
~Z
May 1st, 2008 at 1:24 pm
Just out of curiosity, Sirlin, how much Netbattle did you actually play? What are your opinions on Pokemon’s design, and what flaws in the design did you try to remedy with Kongai?
May 1st, 2008 at 1:27 pm
James, I’ll take the last question first. I answered it in the form of a 3,000 word essay that will hopefully appear on gamasutra.com next week.
May 1st, 2008 at 1:38 pm
Sweet! Looking forward to it.
May 1st, 2008 at 1:53 pm
I just felt flattered with sirlin’s said about my thread(i’m pollo). I wanted to say that i’m working on modding a game to build the game i want, and i have to say that i;m a little lost, i know exactly what i want, but i have no clue on how to get to it. But i know i’m getting in a different direction (i’m building a TBS instead of a TCG) , too bad i lack the resources, and game’s design experience of sirlin.
I couldn’t get into konga’s beta yet, but i really want to try it.
May 1st, 2008 at 5:53 pm
Sirlin, I know you won’t need to be reminded of this, but just in case: Make sure that you link your Gamasutra article here when it’s available! Since I play pokémon competitively (well, sort of, I’m no pro), I’d like to know your opinion about the metagame.
May 1st, 2008 at 9:21 pm
Per the “crappy cards” issue, I have a lot of respect for Mark Rosewater, but I also totally agree with Sirlin on this one. Crappy cards make for a more profitable game, but as far Constructed formats go, they are a joke. The balance of Constructed has always appealed to me much more then the randomness of Limited, so I’m happy to harm the one to enhance the other.
May 1st, 2008 at 9:45 pm
Is there any chancew that that forum topic you were talking about is archived somewhere, Sirlin?
May 1st, 2008 at 11:01 pm
On Bad Cards and Rare Cards in TCGs: I totally agree with you, Sirlin. The card game I designed has a different way of handling the problem, but the key components of (a) not supporting Limited formats and (b) providing strong, well-designed starter decks are there.
One warning from Decipher’s TCGs though: Narrow Cards can be just as frustrating as Bad Cards. The Star Trek and Star Wars TCGs were full of specific ‘hosers’ for strategies to the point where you just hoped nobody had That Card and forged ahead anyway, making for aggravating matches.
May 2nd, 2008 at 3:30 am
James: It’s still in his forums. Look on the second page of the “Game Design” board. The thread is named “A game for Pollo”.
May 2nd, 2008 at 9:30 am
Recently Rosewater and other magic guys have ditanced themselves from some of their older views, including the bad cards stuff.
The funny thing about bad cards is that even if you TRY to make all good cards you’ll make some bad ones by mistake. There’s no need to force the issue.
May 2nd, 2008 at 12:25 pm
james could you please link me to where mark rosewater has stated that? really i wento off magic mainly because i decided not to go off on a game where the main developer would think like he thinks. In fact the reason i left magic definitly was a Email discussion i had with him where he defended the bad card thing and the luck. If he is really changing his mind and doing something about it , can be the reason alone i’m going back into magic. So please, if you can link me to such evidence, do so.
May 2nd, 2008 at 2:14 pm
That particular issue was addressed by Devin Low I think, in an article about limited. Someone posted the link before in an earlier discussion, I don’t have it handy. The gist of it was that limited was going to have fewer bad cards because recognizing bad cards was a stupid skill to emphasize.
Regardless though I’d read forums and look at set spoilers rather than go off of anything they wrote.
May 3rd, 2008 at 2:24 am
Eh, I’m in the beta of Kongai too and don’t really find it all that nice at all. I don’t know, I simply don’t.
May 4th, 2008 at 3:06 pm
No game, despite how well it may be designed, will appeal to everyone. It’s perfectly fine to not like a game.
It only becomes improper when people use their ‘I don’t like it.’ opinion to call the game’s quality into question, without pointing to other evidence.
May 4th, 2008 at 6:08 pm
I wasn’t saying it’s bad, I was saying that I don’t like it =/
Sorry if I implied anything else… heck, I don’t like Street Fighter either, but I’d never say it’s a bad game. Reading about all these design decisions helps me understand just how… sophisticated a game it is. ^^
May 6th, 2008 at 12:49 pm
Trotim, it would probably help Sirlin if you stated why you didn’t like the game. I’m actually curious as to why, and I haven’t even played Kongai yet. ;-)
I wonder if this game will be a good test to see if the masses will appreciate a smartly designed CCG. Getting rid of the overpowered rares and the annoying bad cards is something that people aren’t used to. I’m really hoping that players take to this new game (from what I understand of it), but then again… the pessimist in me almost expects that the majority just wants what’s been done before. I constantly wonder why people keep playing those level-grinding MMOs. Yuck.
Any word on if the beta is coming to a close soon or not? I just unlocked my first card and it’s mocking me, saying “You can’t play me!”
May 7th, 2008 at 1:44 am
The game is meant to appeal to fighting game fans. It’s built on the same principles of yomi and such. I don’t think there was any intention to appeal to a broader fan base, and if you don’t enjoy what fighting games had to offer already, then the only thing kongai possibly has to enjoy is the slightly slower pace of gameplay. For the same reasons, I wouldn’t compare it to a CCG either…
Also, I don’t know why you would need to wonder about why people play an MMO… think of it like a giant animated chat room. It has all the benefits of a community that you get by playing fighting games or RTS or w/e, without any of the pressure of trying to win tournaments or anything else. It’s the video game equivalent of getting together with some friends on the weekend to drink beer and watch football. (Except you don’t have to endure the tedium of a football game… so it’s a win/win)
May 7th, 2008 at 3:36 am
Well, there’s the tedium of leveling, most of the time ;)
May 7th, 2008 at 1:46 pm
Sirlin, if you’ve ever played the most popular card game presently on Kongregate, “Castlewars”, can you comment on its quality and appeal? Are the design principles and goals of that game and Kongai completely different, or are there any similarities?
May 7th, 2008 at 9:22 pm
KIMaster,
I can’t answer all of your questions, since some require Sirlin’s input, but I can answer some.
Firstly, it’s difficult to concisely express Kongai’s design goals. I could link you to many different things I’ve read from Sirlin, but that’d be tedious and time consuming, so instead I’ll say this:
Kongai is an online competitive card game based on a simple system of rock (attack), paper (switch), scissors (intercept), designed to be inclusive and facilitate “easy fun” with a reasonable amount of competitive depth (mostly possible due to the double-blind nature of the game) while almost exclusively testing thinking as a skill (specifically, yomi and appraisal). Kongai also hopes to *not* follow in the same footsteps as other card games by not ripping off players to be successful and to make all in-game options useful and valid.
http://www.kongregate.com/forums/1/topics/3965?page=2#posts-113523
Castle Wars is very similar (it’s also double-blind), but it isn’t based on rock/paper/scissors. The Castle Wars game description (I think) describes that CW made use of ideas from another game, so I guess look to that game if you want to know what Castle Wars was trying to test.
What is Kongai like?
My Kongai FAQ answers that question in-depth:
http://www.kongregate.com/forums/1/topics/3965?page=2#posts-113523
If you’d like to explore some of the ancient, secret lore that gave rise to Kongai, check out these links:
http://www.sirlin.net/forums/showthread.php?t=3
http://www.sirlin.net/.ubb/Forum10/HTML/000040-4.html
Interestingly, I have almost the exact same requirements that Sirlin and Pollo have/had, and have been intuitively searching for a game with those properties my entire life. It’s taken 22 years and a Street Fighter champion to make that happen, ha.
(Although, so we acknowledge what Sirlin is *now* instead of just labeling him based on his past achievements: while Street Fighter is Sirlin’s heritage, he’s since taken what he learned from that game and gone on to explore parralell concepts and has become a fine thinker and well-developed human being. It’s a little known fact that Sirlin is among one of the most interesting and effective people on the planet, along with Steve Pavlina of www.StevePavlina.com, a former highly successful indie game designer—who I like to think of as Sirlin’s unlikely arch-nemesis, heh—and a few other people who come in a close second. Funny how concepts found in competitive games go hand-in-hand with becoming an exceptional human being).
Anyway, since it relates to the properties Sirlin, Pollo, and myself were looking for, I’ll finish by making my first public reference of my new revolutionary game idea:
After exploring games with the properties I’ve been searching for (which was previously difficult because, prior to Kongai, such games didn’t exist), as well as a few other games, and adding to that the various values I feel are important, I’ve developed a slightly different criteria to what I think of as my ideal game.
This ideal game would likely be extremely popular and would appeal to both the hardcore and “casual” audience, unlike most games that only appeal to the hardcore or the casual, but never both.
If Kongai and Street Fighter fall on one extreme in that they purely test thinking, and games like Devil May Cry 3, God of War, and the Tenkaichi series fall on the other extreme in that they mostly test action-reaction, my ideal game lies somewhere in the middle. What’s great is that the essential concepts and the values they’re tempered with lend themselves to many different styles, ideas, and varying degrees of certain properties.
— Bruce
May 7th, 2008 at 9:34 pm
PS.
With this link:
http://www.sirlin.net/.ubb/Forum10/HTML/000040-4.html
… change the page number to 1, which means you should visit this link:
http://www.sirlin.net/.ubb/Forum10/HTML/000040.html
May 7th, 2008 at 10:16 pm
As a quick side, I’ve seen Castle War before, except it was called Arcomage and it was an in-game minigame to Heroes of Might and Magic 7. It was a lot of fun, but playing a CCG style game with totally symmetrical decks gets old very fast. The only skill involved, making optimal plays for long and short term board position, is made even more one dimensional by the symmetrical decks.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arcomage
May 7th, 2008 at 10:45 pm
Quote: “Castle Wars is very similar (it’s also double-blind) …”
What do you mean by that? Castlewars is just a card game in which the players take turns (with hidden decks), not simultaneous at all like Kongai, so what would you mean by ‘double-blind’ here? Would you call practically every card game ‘double-blind’ with your lingo?
Also the ‘double’ part in double-blind I don’t really get. I am only familiar with this term in use with experiments in which both the experimenter and the subject don’t know whether they receive a placebo or real drug. Your usage I don’t get. I would probably just call it a simultaneous game, because Kongai doesn’t actually hide information as far as I know, the moves are just simultaneous (as opposed to sequential, like Castlewars and open as opposed to with hidden information, like Castlewars). So why call it blind? Why call it double-blind?
May 7th, 2008 at 11:14 pm
Double blind just means that each player makes their choice at the same time without seeing what the other player will do.
May 7th, 2008 at 11:32 pm
Do you happen to have a reference for that usage? Anyone else who uses that instead of ‘blind’ or ’simultaneous’ or something? :)
May 7th, 2008 at 11:46 pm
I have played some castlewars (about 50 games under my belt with a 2:1 win/loss ratio)
-It is not double-blind, it is turn-based. Any time you take your turn, you know every move made up to that point, and your opponent doesn’t decide his next move until after you make yours.
-You can customize decks, which would matter if the game was deeper but as it stands there’s not much variance between good decks. You have to play all 3 “colors.” There are a number of cards that are so good you almost have to play them (the 8-point resource generator cards, Thief, Curse). You need 75 cards and there aren’t that many cards to begin with.
-In my limited experience, Castlewars seems the opposite of Kongai in that there nearly always seems to be a clearly correct play regardless of what your opponent is holding. The exceptions I’ve noticed still don’t create interesting yomi decisions, as they mostly fall in one of two categories: Either there is this one card or class of cards that can wreck you, so you play around it without really losing anything if you are wrong. The other category is the “flip a coin” category, stuff like “should I use Crush Crystals in case he has Sorcerer, or Crush Weapons in case he has Recruit?” The one thing I can think of that doesn’t fall under either of these is the observation that better players seem to do a better job of not getting wrecked by thief in the early game (they seem to deliberately keep their resources low enough that you can’t drain for the full 15)
May 8th, 2008 at 4:28 am
Xanthus: You’re right that the term is arguably not the most appropriate, and simultaneous is almost equally descriptive, since by implication you’re opponent’s move is “hidden” if you have to move at the same time. However, it is standard usage.. you’ll find it all over this site, often used by Sirlin himself. Blind because their is hidden information, double because it applies to both players. The fact that there isn’t any example of a “single blind” game to require both words, doesn’t invalidate the term.
May 8th, 2008 at 5:08 am
It’s good how you took the idea of Netbattle, simplified it a lot, and still managed to make it interesting with enough depth; I used to play Netbattle a lot, and I did eventually get accustomed to the typing’s resistances, weaknesses etc, but I was later bored. It’s complexity did strangle some of its fun for me, yet it resolved the tedium of making a team (which takes far more effort than it should in the actual games- EVs, IVs, abilities, natures and levelling up. If you don’t care much for them, you risk getting flattened by a freind who did). Also, some Pokémon are deliberately horrible for no good reason, (one pokémon, Unown, can only learn one move that lacks any real power with generally bad stats), which is a shame as it limits what you can use. It makes many of the monsters pointless to use, or unhelpful to have on your team, much like bad cards in a deck. This isn’t helped by there being more and more monsters being made every set of games (450 in the latest I think- and you’d only see about 40 of them in competitve play on Wi-Fi I’m guessing). Netbattle remedied this somewhat with tier systems, but there’s no excusing it.
May 8th, 2008 at 6:44 am
The term just sounds weird to me, even if Sirlin uses it ;-) Partly because the word simultaneous is more descriptive to my ears (it directly implies not knowing the opponent’s move, while blind leaves you in the dark about what you do and do not know), and partly because I only know the term from medical studies, where the ‘double’ prefix applies to having both the group of patients and the examiners not knowing anything, and so it seems like a strange prefix having that in the back of my mind.
Claytus, you call it standard usage, do you have something a bit authoritative, not related to this game? (I’d hope so, since most of game theory is about these kind of games, so there probably are a lot of words for them.)
You guys are entirely free to introduce a new usage for the word ‘double-blind’ of course, it’s just that it sounds a bit off to me, so I wanted to talk about it a little bit.
May 8th, 2008 at 7:23 am
What’s all this about double-blind? I’ve run Street Fighter tournaments for over 15 years all over the US that allowed players double-blind character selection if they want it. Each player makes his character choice “blind” from what the other person picked. Xanthus is the first person I have ever seen question this in all that time. This term in gaming far predates even “ggpo” so it’s not exactly new.
May 8th, 2008 at 8:23 am
Heck, the term double blind in gaming goes as far back as table top wargames in the 70s. The term in this useage is, as the kids would say, ‘hella old’.
May 8th, 2008 at 11:12 am
Double blind is not much a gaming one but one used in scientific trials , and it meaning is very old and it means closely the same
May 8th, 2008 at 5:44 pm
Ok, I guess it’s just coincidence that I haven’t heard it before :)
Next week Kongai will let in more beta testers and I will get in, finally, seeing as I only joined Kongregate after reading about Kongai here, planning to play it.
May 8th, 2008 at 11:25 pm
What’s “ggpo”? :(
May 9th, 2008 at 1:58 am
Good game, peace out.
May 9th, 2008 at 5:50 pm
I love how “Bruce” typed out a super long response, and gave no actual answer to the question. I guess some people will do anything for even anonymous Internet attention, and the perception of being considered intelligent is more valuable to them than the intelligence itself.
Thanks to everyone else for answering the question, though. The distinction between acting at the same time and turn-based is huge, almost completely different card game genres entirely.