8 Responses to “My Book on Gamasutra”

1. Chadius Says:
   September 9th, 2006 at 10:08 pm

   Congrats on getting the article in Gamasutra.

2. Fieari Says:
   September 10th, 2006 at 1:14 am

   A traditional publisher might be able to sell it for cheaper too… it’s kinda expensive right now. I spend enough money on college text books.

3. GregT Says:
   September 10th, 2006 at 9:06 am

   Once again, great book. When I bought it I accidentally ordered two copies, so a friend ended up with the spare. Now it’s a favourite topic of debate, wherein we discuss whether it’s a valid gaming philosophy or not, mostly while he’s losing at SoulCalibur III.

4. Forty Says:
   September 13th, 2006 at 11:32 am

   Does Playing To Win discuss the PvP gear gap in World of Warcraft (and, fundamentally, many MMOs) and how you believe that diverges from your PTW philosophy? I’d like to read more about your opinions on that controversial subject, and I’m wondering if picking up the book will offer me any further insights.

5. Punisher Says:
   September 14th, 2006 at 1:32 am

   I recently picked up WOW again after making the stupid time consuming grind to HWL and discarding the current “competitive ” mecahnics as broken. However, with the arena system and some of the changes slated to take place in Burncing Crusade, Its defintely possible that blizzard will come very close to completley remeding the situation. Theres a lot of room for strategic PVP in WOW, that has a strong metagame, like picking the 5 man team before the fight and entering the arena. For example 2 warriors, 2 pallies, and 1 shaman could walk over almost any team! But a team stacked with 2 or 3 mages can destroy that team, which would be countered by a heavy shaman/warlock team or even a subtelty rogue and so on and so forth. To say the least things will be interesting when BC comes out if a lot of these changes go through!

6. David Kotsonis Says:
   September 22nd, 2006 at 2:47 am

   You’ve got a review up at http://www.starcitygames.com/php/news/article/12796.html which is both complimentary and critical. The Ferrett makes some good points; you should check it out if you haven’t already.

7. Mitch Says:
   September 27th, 2006 at 9:11 pm

   I read the excerpt and impressed. Good luck signing on with a traditional publisher!

8. Rob Says:
   September 28th, 2006 at 2:50 am

   This is my favorite part from Ferrett’s review:

   “But here’s the frustrating part: This is where the book ends.

   There’s next to no discussion on how to improve these skills. He mentions that Virtua Fighter champions tend to have great Yomi skills and Magic players are excellent at Appraisal, but aside from that you’re left with the burning question: If I don’t have a talent for Yomi, how do I gain it?”

   Especially the last sentence.

   It’s not that you can’t learn certain skills, or that they can’t be taught; it’s that people with the “Playing to Win” philosophy are usually not good at teaching how to apply the philosophy. After all, it’s something you must experience for yourself.

   Like in Street Fighter, for example, you can completely dominate your opponent and afterwards they’ll wonder how you did so, and perhaps ask you to teach them.

   How do you go about teaching them that you know all of your characters moves and how to best apply them, that you know all of your opponents moves and can expect and counter them? It’s hard to explain that after you try to counter my attacks a few times you might - just might, it could take anything from one try to a million - have something click in your head that will let you always counter those attacks. After all, if you can’t experience it, you’d just think I’m crazy.

   Which brings me to another quote in the review:

   “You often wish that Sirlin would spend time in, say, a sample game where he takes this principle and walks you through the thought process required to join Sun Tzu to you.”

   This is actually something I was considering doing, except I don’t have nearly enough experience in a lot of games to be able to make it work.
   Perhaps then, you could offer a sort of send-in-your-own type of thing.

   I’ll give you a general first-person shooter as an example.

   When you start playing, the first thing you should do is “know yourself”.

   What weapons are there? Which ones have good aim, and which have good power? Which are just bad overall? Can you jump? Does jumping affect your aim? Can you run? Can you sprint? Do these affect your aim? How is health handled in this game? Are there shields? Do you die in one hit? Can you get wounded and limp around?
   This part is about knowing your limits, and it’s one part of knowing yourself.

   Before, you were probably just testing out the controls and learning all the little details. Now you will actually be moving around, so it’s time to know your terrain.
   For example, do your footprints make noise? Do you leave footprints in snow? Are there any cliffs you should avoid? Are there any hills you can hide behind? What can you use as cover? Are there any elevated spots where I can see the whole map, or a good area of the map?
   This is the second part of knowing yourself. Now you know what you can do and where you can go.

   This leads right into the last part of knowing yourself: Strategy.
   Once you know what you can do, and where you can do, you can come up with a strategy that tells you what you should do and where you should go. What you should avoid, and how you should position yourself to have an advantage over your opponents.

   Now that you know yourself, you will play at least somewhat well. You won’t win everything, of course. Many people stop here, and I guess there’s no harm in that.

   But to know yourself and your enemy, like Sun Tzu says, is to win every battle.

   There’s not much to say about knowing your enemy, because that, too, comes with experience. But to know your enemy is to know that your enemy knows themself and that he will do everything in his power to win.

   A strategy you may have come up with may become void when you realize that your enemy is using it too - or first, rather. And so, you must come up with a counter-strategy, and then it comes down to Yomi and adaptability from there.

   In writing all this out, I learned at least one thing. A picture of the game you’re playing, with detailed points like mine, would help people understand better than everything I just wrote. A video would explain a lot better.

   Perhaps this would go better on your forum, but I don’t like forums.

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