Playing to Win Interviews
Today two different interviews I did about Playing to Win went up.
One is an audio interview as part of Bridger's show on tsncentral.com. The show is about the real-time strategy game Company of Heroes, and this particular episode covered the concept of approaching the game (or any game) from the right mindset. My part appears about 43 and a half minutes into the show, I think.
The other interview appeared on Gamepro.com, conducted by World Forms.
As always, some people think it's super great, and I put into words what they always wanted to say. Other people hate it and think it's a stupid mindset. I'd say most of those people are not really listening very closely. Perhaps it came as a surprise that in the tsncentral interview, I said that playing to maximize your ranking is something I mostly look down on, and that playing exclusively to win is a barrier to your own improvement. Anyway, you can listen to it yourself if you care.
Thanks to both Bridger and World of Forms for being thoughtful interviewers who did their homework and asked great questions.
--Sirlin
April 18th, 2007 at 3:04 pm
I really liked the interview, but I thought you all missed an important point when it comes to the new player coming to a game where people already have plenty of experience. I think in a lot of cases, the new player gets a head start because he has access to all the knowledge and experience of those who came before him. While Someone may of played a game for so and so amount of time, the high end tactics have probably evolved sgnificiently from then. While the experienced player still has an advantage, the gap is actually much smaller. The new player jumps right into the current tactics and can probably catch up relatively quickly.
I can only think of two examples where this doesn’t apply.
FPSs…. but those are games where the ‘bringing in skills from other games” REALLY applies and kind of makes up for it. And..
Very Old Games. Like Street Fighter II, Starcraft and even MVC2(I think you’d have to be insane to jump into MVC2 at this point). But even then, the game is fresh to the player and he’s likely going to play and practice more often then experienced players, thusly giving him a good chance at catching up.
April 18th, 2007 at 4:14 pm
[…] PJ Swenson wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptThe show is about the real-time strategy game Company of Heroes, and this particular episode covered the concept of approaching the game (or any game) from the right mindset. My part appears about 43 and a half minutes into the show, … […]
April 18th, 2007 at 7:47 pm
[…] deskblog wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptThe show is about the real-time strategy game Company of Heroes, and this particular episode covered the concept of approaching the game (or any game) from the right mindset. My part appears about 43 and a half minutes into the show, … […]
April 19th, 2007 at 2:54 pm
Playing to win all the time is really a bad strategy.
When A3 first came out I was messing around with V-Cody at the MIT arcade. I was the only person to use V-ism at all. Every other person tried it at most once, said “it sucks” and went back to A-ism.
Of course I was playing a new character and trying to do V-ism combos while everyone else was just A-Sakura and spamming fierce and roundhouse.
But a couple of weeks later I had mastered some pretty impressive VCs and was owning them. Ha ha, just kidding. A couple of weeks later I decided that A3 was really boring and stopped playing it seriously. But in an alternate dimension where A3 isn’t a sucky game I got really good with V-Cody while everyone else kept spamming firece with Sak forever.
April 19th, 2007 at 3:30 pm
James M’s story delivers on many levels.
April 20th, 2007 at 2:22 am
For James M:
A+++ Post, would read again.
April 20th, 2007 at 11:26 pm
Perhaps if it was retitled “Playing to Get Better and How to Do So” then people wouldn’t get so defensive.
April 21st, 2007 at 1:35 pm
Sirlin, as a competitive gamer myself, who not only enjoys playing, but also listening/watching broadcasts of competition, I gotta say I was disappointed that you did an interview with TSN. :(
Maybe I should have ReDeYe of QuadV or perhaps the Radio iTG guys (I talk with Khonsu from iTG a lot, and know he’s personally a big fan of yours.) contact you? Maybe even get you a spot on Epileptic Gaming?
April 21st, 2007 at 2:24 pm
Amp: I don’t know what any of that means, but yeah sure. I try to make time for interviews with anyone at least semi-legit.
–Sirlin
April 21st, 2007 at 3:15 pm
Uh, oh, I feel like I’m about to go into a long-winded explanation again. :( Oh well, don’t read roughly the next 3 or 4 paragraphs if you don’t wanna deal with that shit…
Well, in the competitive gaming communities (outside of fighting, which seems to like being an anomaly all its own, dead or alive 4 excluded), just like in “regular” sports, there are live broadcasts on the internet with color commentary provided 90% of the time. Along with being able to provide things like interviews with players and other such coverage.
Right now there are three “major” companies that provide these broadcasts/interviews/competetive gaming shows: TSN (tsncentral.com), iTG (radioitg.com), and the more recently born QuadV (QuadV.com)
Personally, I, and a lot of other people in the competitive communities (especially those of us playing Quake), despise TSN with nearly every fiber of my being. In my opinion they only had one good commentator, who is ironically now a member of QuadV.
iTG is my preferred source for competitive gaming entertainment when I don’t want to play, and their founder, Marcus Graham (djWHEAT) also has a daily casual-gaming talk show that tends to mix in a bit of a competition twist, called Epileptic Gaming (epilepticgaming.com).
===(You can start reading again)===
Personally, I’d like to see you hop on Epileptic Gaming, especially to see your take on the decisions that the World Series of Video Games has made as far as the games they are supporting this year for competition (http://www.thewsvg.com/, their 4 games are in the big banner on the top). Which has been a semi-ongoing subject (as it’s quite controversial) since the choices were made public.
Anyway, I guess I’ll start trying to talk to Khonsu or maybe even djWHEAT himself to see if they wanna get ahold of you for something.
April 22nd, 2007 at 10:23 pm
To Amp:
Any exposure is good exposure. Read what he said again: He is willing to do an interview with any legit or semi-legit media organization.
To Brider’s credit, he was recently invited to a large Apple convention for his highly popular Tales of Hero’s podcast.
On to the interview. This is the second interview that Sirlin has done for Bridger and TsN. The first being the Bridger and Harlock show a few years back.
April 23rd, 2007 at 1:36 pm
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@ Amp, comment #10 (the part you wanted Sirlin to read):
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Instead of getting Sirlin to talk about “drama” and controversial decisions (things that will likely just have Sirlin rehashing a lot of what he’s already said in his articles), try and get him to talk about something interesting instead — something that takes the playing to win mindset into new ground, or at least, fleshes it out with some personal stories, practical examples that bring the “abstract” playing to win mindset more down to earth, or some other examples or ideas that haven’t been mentioned in Sirlin’s playing to win series, his blog, his other articles, as well as his book. You know, something new that will also serve to be a good introduction for gamers who are unaware of the playing to win mindset, but will also be useful to veteran Sirlin fans who’ve read everything he’s written so far about playing to win.
(And you may argue that the playing to win mindset is already down to earth/practical, but only to those who understand it and have experience with using it… not so much for people who are new to the mindset. Practical examples, personal stories, and talking about things in a different light, even if they may be the same conceptually, helps newbies and veterans alike. I’d love to hear more about how Sirlin — specifically Sirlin himself — applies the playing to win mindset based on his unique strengths and preferences. I’m sure it would help others to learn how they can apply the ideas to their particular strengths/preferences… although Sirlin may need to write another book to do that justice. ;))
Sirlin is a busy man (I think it was 3 different card games he was working on + work… that can’t be easy), and I feel this would be the best use of his time (of course, it’s up to Sirlin to decide that, but I digress). If he is just going to say things he’s already said, you may as well just get the people who do those radio shows to tell their readers to go read the playing to read articles (or even better, the book) or just have the announcer/guys doing the show read parts of them on air and discuss it, since you don’t need Sirlin to do that.
What you DO need Sirlin for, however, is to expand (his take on) the playing to win mindset into new ground (or again, at least re-touch on things he’s already covered, but with new personal stories, analogies, ideas, etc) since he’s really the only person who can do that effectively since Sirlin really is *the* playing to win guy (others may “use” the mindset, but they don’t really advocate it like Sirlin does… do correct me if I’m wrong, Sirlin). Doing this will likely require the radio interviewer to actually do some research and ask some decent questions (ie. even better, or at least different questions then what Sirlin was asked during the most recent audio interview Sirlin did), but yep, that isn’t that hard (even if you’ve only read Sirlin’s playing to win article series and not the book).
And if you don’t understand why I’m such an advocate of expanding things past where they’ve already been, think of it like this: Imagine if God of War 2 was basically God of War 1 (same levels, same combat, monsters etc) with just a few additions here and there to make it look “fresh”. It would likely be boring and a great disappointment since from playing the first game, we know the Sony Santa Monica team is capable of so much more.
Instead of traversing through content we’ve already been through, gamers want a rich new worlds filled with interesting things to explore, new secrets to find, and new experiences to have. The same applies with Sirlin talking about playing to win. I (and I’m sure many other people) want to see “Playing to Win 2” (ie. something new), not “Playing to Win 1: Repackaged content just under the name of Playing to Win 2” (ie. nothing new, just repetition).
As for getting Sirlin on a radio show with your ITG contacts, I’d get Marcus Graham (djWHEET) to do it. I think he’ll ask better questions based on his vast experience with covering the competitive gaming world (including his actual experience of playing Quake, and any other games he played that I’m not aware of, competitively), and I think he could throw some interesting “curve ball” questions that could make for an interesting interview (although I doubt Sirlin would get caught of guard, heh).
I also think Marcus has the most “high energy” personality out of all of the Radio ITG guys that I’ve heard, and I think it would make for a better, more interesting/enjoyable interview. I can appreciate what Khonsu tries to do for competitive gaming and the whole “eSports” thing, but, from what I’ve heard of the games he has covered and him talking on ITG shows, I think he’s still got a way to go before he rivals the passion that Marcus (djWHEET) so easily conveys in his various coverage/shows. (If you are reading this, Khonsu, do keep it up! I’m sure you have it in you.)
- Bruce
April 23rd, 2007 at 1:40 pm
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@ Sirlin (about the actual audio interview):
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It’s great to see you infecting more people (especially the scrubs) with the playing to win meme. ;) I enjoyed the interview (and thought it was great to actually hear you talk about playing to win, instead of me/others just reading about it), even if it only covered the basics.
I liked the ideas about learning the weaknesses of a tactic/move (etc) by using it yourself, and I also found the story about the player who used his crazy “pixel vision” to use supposedly crappy characters to his advantage really interesting, since it destroys the common “elistist” (scrub-like) mindset that some people who practice playing to win fall into at times (when they get too caught up in their mental model of what they think is good/bad that isn’t at all acurate based on what the game considers to be good/bad) and shows how (almost) anything can be effective, what it’s really about is how and when you use it.
Really, it’s a matter of being open minded and creatively using your strengths to see how they can create some unique opportunities for yourself instead of saying “this tactic sucks” and walling yourself off new potential that you could have tapped. I admittedly benefited from that story as my thinking had become very “hard” and unchanging (instead of flexible and exploratory, like water) without my knowing it, and now I can see that is the case and go about changing it.
I especially liked hearing that you actually play with your friends when you first play games instead of fully just “playing to win” (but by doing that, you are in fact playing to win because it’s the “winning move” that will let you progress). I found that interesting (as opposed to saying “oh noes! The guy who advocates playing to win doesn’t always play to win!!!11! Lets go post angry comments on his blog!).
I’d personally like to hear about the areas that you, even with your vast gaming experience, still have trouble with when it comes to the playing to win mindset (it being a “rough pool” as you said), why you have trouble with it, and how you go about dealing with those things (because even a “suboptimal” strategy that doesn’t seem optimal is optimal if you currently know of nothing better to use).
I’d also really like to hear more about the different player types (people generally fall into set “player types” where differences are a matter of degree, not essence) and how those different player types can go about implementing the playing to win mindset. Why? Because I very much see how effective the playing to win mindset is in all areas of your life (not just gaming), and I think the information about this mindset, how it can be used, etc, is of great benefit to people (not just gamers).
As for what you could improve for interviews you may do in the future, I think you could work on eliminating (or at least, reducing) some of your verbal pauses (things like, “umm”, “ahh”, and filler words such as “like”), and if possible, it would be nice if the sound quality of your on-air responses was similar to the sound quality you can hear in your Street Fighter tutorial videos that you did.
Although that’s probably something you can’t really do much about… but that said, it depends what you are using to connect with the guy who does the show. Using a phone is usually bad, since phones have terrible quality. I’ve heard some guys who do radio shows use Skype (www.skype.com) to put people on air, and it sounded far, far better then when they had people calling in from the phone. A really low quality headset (as opposed to using a standalone mic + separate headphones) can also improve sound quality.
Anyway, if you were at all interested on working on the verbal pauses thing, here’s an article that may assist with that. I know you’re not a professional speaker, but I’ve worked on this area myself (I’m not a pro speaker either), and it does wonders for making whatever you have to say more clear and cohesive, which I’m sure would benefit you in your role of being a designer/producer with your work since I’m sure you have to communicate with people often, and clear communication is key (especially when you’re working with a deadline). The link:
http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2005/07/eliminating-verbal-pauses/
- Bruce
April 23rd, 2007 at 2:15 pm
It sounds like Bruce is my agent, doesn’t it? Probably the most complimentary post ever about me that I’ve seen. Thanks for the tips about sound quality and verbal pauses. I can also see how asking me more questions about “not playing to win” would be interesting. There are very few games I’m able to make the real leap into, and many games I’ve stayed away from solely because I don’t many gamer friends to do the initial learning with. I found DOTA to have an especially brutal learning curve, for example. Damn all those items and their organization into various vendors.
I also have examples of other players who started playing a game “after the fact” and were able to dominate it anyway. Each one uses some different method, but they all boil down to doing things no one else predicted would ever pan out.
I considered writing Playing to Win 2, and I have some notes on it, but nothing further. As I have hinted at before, the subject would be exploring the link between personality types and success in competitive games. Different personality types have different brain-wirings. There are different ways people process information, and different mechanisms people use to make decisions based on the information they process. There is biological basis for this, and each method of info processing/deciding leads to different personality types.
I would write a book on that, but I haven’t been going to as many competitions in the last couple years, so it’s harder. Instead I started notes on a book about game design. Then I stopped that and started these 3 card games. Then I stopped working on the 3rd one to focus on the other 2. And now, well, you’ll have to read between the lines. If I had a nickel for every project I worked on that would probably have blown your mind had it not be cancelled…I’d probably have 15 cents. My time is now taken up completely by something that will either end up with me having 20 cents, or in something amazing finally happening. Playing to Win 2 will have to wait a while.
–Sirlin
April 24th, 2007 at 7:20 am
Offtopic: I agree entirely with you about DOTA’s learning curve, it’s really not user-friendly at all. I’d recommend finding a friend who will teach you/play with you a few games, as it’s really not intuitive at all, and most players are less than kindly hospitable to the inexperienced. The game isn’t really worth playing in public games with strangers on battlenet anyways, so having friends who play it is a definite plus. There are all sorts of esoteric knowledge that a player requires to play the game well, including a host of random facts and knowledge about what stacks and works and what does not, and it’s really not collated anywhere in a single guide as far as I know.
On topic: Interesting interviews! Not really that new material to me, but interesting nonetheless.
April 25th, 2007 at 1:19 am
Offtopic: If you want to learn more, the DOTA website has a lot of good posts in the Strategy section of their forums (forums.dota-allstars.com); specifically, relating to the more esoteric things like what orbs stack (there’s a handy spreadsheet), what lane control is and why it’s important (don’t just stand there autoattacking!), and a post that has links to every strategy guide written on those forums for each individual hero. Most of these go into considerable depth about advanced strategies using said hero.
Ontopic:
April 25th, 2007 at 3:29 am
Heya!
I’m a dota player and also playing-to-win fan :)
Actually, i only started up on dota a few months ago… but the skill levels of players in the scene are not so great you can’t get up to par with all but the very greatest players in that time.
THAT SAID: i remember my initial few games of dota, after getting dragged into it by an old friend. Just… wow. Almost the entire game is concealed from the newbie, although i think that’s probably unintentional. Even just getting the items straightened out (in your head) is only the simplest of steps to take, not even really a part of the “real” game. (Item choice/choice theory is a real part of the game, but that’s one that even most hardcore dota players only understand through intuition and one you can’t really get into until you understand a whole stack of other stuff first.) The dota-allstars forum has all or almost all the relevant material (except the really high-level stuff that the “professional” dota clans keep to themselves) but it is so disorganized and the forum itself so hostile it’s difficult to figure out.
And have i mentioned that a disturbingly large percent of dota players are complete scum?
Actually, i was going to mention dota here after reading some of the comments anyway! I was going to mention it because i perhaps have a question or suggestion for Sirlin–maybe something that he doesn’t have an answer for!
First, some background on the dota community. Relevantly, the vast majority of dota players are scrubs. Even the top-level players, who could undoubtedly destroy me and all of my friends. Their technical skills may be excellent, but they fail to recognize their own scrubbiness. Instead, everyone is playing their own house-ruled dota. Even in tournaments.
Take, for example, MYM Prime Defending [”PriDe”] #5. (MYM is an enormous and powerful clan, one of the best and most respected in the dota community at least.) Note the “bugs and restrictions” section of the rules! Now, i think that for dota, saying that bugs should not be used is fair–due to the nature of the game, bugs are introduced and then quashed regularly and developing comprehensive strategies around them (importantly: to counter them, so that every tournament isn’t just “abuse the hell out of the latest bug before it is fixed) is thus impossible. However, this is “classic scrub behavior #1″! As i argue, it only appears to be in this context… but that mindset exists in even the top players. However, there is no real defense for the rest of the stuff. Not that i have seen, at least.
I will (briefly) take the rules in order, although there’s probably no need to read all of them, so if you want you can just skip down to the line below:
- Creep skipping is simply running in front of your automatic attacks (or sneaking around behind the enemy’s automatic attacks) rather than (”honorably”) following your automated units around the map. In other words, it is illegal to sneak into enemy territory. This is famously called “backdooring”, and it has a very very very poor reputation in (American) dota despite nobody being able to mount a coherent argument against it.
- Bristleback and Alchemist, two Sentinel heroes, are banned. Now, it’s true that in the version in question both of these heroes are extremely powerful… but being extremely powerful isn’t even justification for being banned, as there are many other powerful heroes that are not banned! My secret suspicion is that these two heroes don’t fit into the mental model of “what makes a good hero”. This may be an artifact from the old days–when not all heroes were available to all players–but even then there would typically be two games, with the goal being to even balance out between the teams.
- The “2 Mekansm” to “1 Aegis per hero” rules all fall into restrictions of what you can buy in-game. There is absolutely no internal restriction, it is entirely based on what the people who designed this tournament thought was “fair” or “appropriate”. The argument, here, is that breaking these rules makes the game degenerate.
- The others (mostly) are about item and gold sharing. The fear here is that if all the players pooled their resources they could create a single, incredibly strong hero. And they could. But so what? Maybe that–building a single enormous hero and then having everyone else scrape by–is the REAL GAME of dota. (In fact, already there is this distinction: there are “carry” heroes, who spend most of the game farming up items and then destroying everything.)
——————- Big line of “you can jump to here” ———————-
So anyway, all of these rules are classic scrub maneuvers. It might be true that the game would degenerate if they were not followed, but how do we know? As far as i’m aware, we don’t. And maybe that’s just how it goes–dota is degenerate as-is.
So that’s problem #1, a problem Sirlin has talked about a very great deal. Now here’s another problem, which Sirlin has talked about briefly: i am a new-ish player to this game and scene and want to push the “play to win” mentality, washing out the scrubby mentality most players currently have. (I don’t have illusions i will wipe out scrubbiness in dota entirely, but getting the tournaments whipped into shape would be nice.) There are a few others in the community, including some top-level players, who feel likewise: let’s just actually play the game and see where things lead. But by and large, even among the top players, that’s not how things are working out.
So what sort of steps can be taken? Has there been an example of a scrubby game scene that transformed into a non-scrubby scene and if so what are the signs to look for? Or maybe, if we don’t have any idea how to change a scene, what are the signs of a scene that plays to win? How can we recognize such a scene? (Other than, of course, the Typical Scrub Behaviors–i’m thinking more “I want to find a competitive game to enjoy, what do i look for?”) Scrubbiness exists everywhere, so just looking for players who exhibit the symptoms isn’t going to be very useful and the top levels of play are often incomprehensible to a newcomer. But how can i find more games like, for instance, Quakeworld (a remarkably non-scrubby game scene where scrubs tend to get chewed up) as opposed to dota?
Of course, this doesn’t have to be done in interview format, but it could be. (Interviewers in the audience: go find a game full of scrubs and then interrogate Sirlin on it! Be an anthropologist for the betterment of competitive gaming everywhere!)
April 30th, 2007 at 3:43 am
An excellent interview, Sirlin. I skipped the rest of the program since I’m not a CoH player myself, but I was happy to find that knowledge of that particular game was not required to understand what you and were interviewers were saying. Kudos to the lot of you for making the interview accessible to all (including the exact time in the interview that you showed up was very thoughtful of your interviewers). I, like everyone on the Internet, have a few comments.
Typically, I’m what I like to call the “casual competitor”, in that I am interested in improving my game but usually don’t have (or devote) the time to do much about in a short period of time. Because I play a such, I find myself looking to others about conventional wisdom about the game, what tends to work and not work, and what I might expect when I hit the ladder or official competition that the game may provide. I have found, especially after visiting this site and speaking to others about the subjects you cover, that this is a very dangerous way of going about things. While I do sometimes reap the benefits of other people’s experience I am also being bogged down by they have already labeled as “cheap”, ineffective, or a complete waste of time. That is, of course, until some top-ranked or highly skilled player does it themselves and find a way to make it work. It’s really quite bafflinf when you think about it.
I have made a few decisions lately about game I do and do not buy and whether or not I will compete in them in any regard, and in several cases I can attribute these sobering choices to what I’ve read here or about here. I think you’ve made a great and logical approach to games that everyone can benefit from and, if everyone read your material and agreed with it, could improve competition all over the computer gaming world. I can’t wait to see what kind of players sprout up because they’ve taken your advice or at least considered it and come to their own rational conclusions.
I’m gonna snag me a copy of your book, too. It sounds interesting.
May 1st, 2007 at 11:43 am
Sirlin, I know this is off topic for this particular blog, but I would enjoy seeing your opinions (perhaps in a new blog entry) on Puzzle Quest, assuming you’ve had a chance to play it. It seems to be a very solidly designed game as far as your criteria for portable games go. You can save pretty much any time you’re not engaged in a puzzle, as far as I know. Some will probably fault it for the fact that there really is no penalty for failure, but I’m curious how you feel about that. Go ahead and ignore all this if you’ve never played the game.
May 1st, 2007 at 3:47 pm
[…] Originally Posted by Vimapa I’ve been playing on InstantChess.com, it’s easy to use and works quickly When I first started playing there, I found out I can learn just by playing. I mean, what better way to get a free lesson? I’m finding that each game, I learn something. I’m posting today because I’m wondering if there are any players here that give free lessons. Or maybe some players that charge a minimal fee. Please let me know if you are interested. It’s beyond the scope of this post to give you any specific lessons related directly to chess, but hopefully I can still be of assistance. While specific lessons passed on by skillful players that play the game of your choice can be of great assistance and certainly have their place, there is much you can learn yourself without the need of direct assistance. If your goal is to win, to learn how to win, or simply to learn and improve, what you really need is the right mindset. There are numerous people who would say that competitive games (whether they be card games, video games, sports-related games, the "game of life", etc) are all about "what" you do, but really, it’s about "why" you do it — the underlying mindset that gives rise to your actions. Learn the mindset, and the "how" will come. Where can you learn such a mindset? There are many places, and it won?t just happen instantly, but if I was to recommend one resource, it would be this website: Sirlin.net ? Your source of shocking insights on game design You may be thinking "What does game design have to do with competitive games?", but just humour me, do a bit of reading on that website, and you’ll understand. I could go into detail, but doing a bit of reading on that website will be able to say everything much better then I could. If you?re not interested… well, I can only show you the door — it is you who has to walk through it. At the very least, I’d recommend you read the articles in the "Playing Competitive Games" category. Personally, if I were you, I’d read everything on the website. From the articles, to the blog posts, to the about page, to the book that is featured — there is much you can learn from the individual (David Sirlin — a professional game designer and a Street Fighter tournament champion) who created the content I speak of. I’ll also let you know that there is a pretty good, fairly recent audio interview with David Sirlin you can download and listen to (it’s related to competitive gaming; if you are interested, I wrote a mini-review and shared my thoughts about it here). If you wish to go even deeper into this "playing to win" mindset (assuming you are serious about this), a good book you can purchase is Playing to Win: Becoming the Champion (also by David Sirlin). It is available for purchase at Lulu.com as well as Amazon.com. And while it may seem that I?m plugging this Sirlin.net website quite a bit in this post, it?s only because I know it has great potential to help you, those in a similar position to you, and even veteran "gamers" who could benefit from being exposed to the "playing to win" mindset and becoming more consciously aware of the concepts they’ve used for so long. In my opinion, Sirlin.net is kind of like the StevePavlina.com of competitive gaming — it’s hard not to enthusiastically recommend it. One last thing before I finish up: As I?ve found with personal development related pursuits (and life in general), if you want to improve, progress, and learn, you must make use of the strategy of immersion. Do keep in mind though, that there?s no need to compartmentalise your life when using this strategy. Often people make the mistake of saying ?what I learn doing X activity cannot be used for anything else?, but that is merely a limiting belief that will stunt your ability to draw interesting (and useful) correlations between the knowledge you have on various subjects. It’s kind of like saying "I know how to stir a pot when cooking, but I can only use that skill for making spaghetti and nothing else". It’s just silly and very limiting, although very much the conventional thinking these days. To give you a better idea of what I mean, it’s the whole notion of using "either/or", zero-sum thinking instead of inclusive, flexible, "AND" thinking. You can see examples of ?either/or? thinking when people say "should I get a job I love but be broke or get a job I hate and have money", where they should be saying "how can I support myself doing something I love" (props go to Steve for driving this mindset home for me ? thanks, Steve! ). If you’d like to learn more about "either/or" and "AND" thinking, listen to this podcast by Steve, or check out this article (there are other articles written by Steve that cover this topic, but I think this article is one of the better ones for breaking out of the habit of either/or thinking… it sure worked for me). Overall, realise that chess, or any other game for that matter, is merely a construct — a vehicle — that allows you to walk the path of self improvement. I?m getting a bit philosophical here, but from a certain perspective, the only opponent you have in a game is yourself. Even the game you play is merely an abstraction — one that acts as an accurate reflection that will always show you where you stand, so long as you interpret it correctly and see it for what it is. And as you progress, I think you’ll find that a large majority of the skills you learn from playing will also prove useful in other pursuits — if you let them. __________________ - Bruce Achterberg […]
May 2nd, 2007 at 2:38 pm
Making up arbitrary rules is really not opposed to playing to win IMO.
Some games are better when users make up rules. Sometimes the rules are silly and unenforceable but sometimes they are perfectly fine.
Playing to win means doing all that you can do within the agreed upon rules. We all agree to ban Akuma in ST. That doesn’t make us scrubs. It is a good rule that makes the game better.
User-created rules are fine, as long as you apply them properly:
1. Do the new rules make the game more fun?
2. If the rules are a workaround for some problem, are you sure the problem doesn’t have a non-rules workaround.
3. Can you really enforce the rule?
Banning roll cancels in CVS2 is a good example of bad rule making. It is hard to enforce, it doesn’t make the game any more fun and it isn’t really a work around to anything. CVS2 with roll cancelling is no less fun than CVS with roll cancelling.
On the other hand, banning Akuma is easy to enforce and makes the game a lot more fun.
I don’t have any problem with players creating their own rules that are not enforced by the game. Most video game makers do not provide rules updates. The rules of many sports change frequently, there is no reason why video game rules shouldn’t also be tweaked.
May 3rd, 2007 at 6:54 pm
“The other interview appeared on Gamepro.com, conducted by World Forms.”
For me this link just leads to a brief synopsis of the book and a couple of brief quotes. Is this correct? Should I be clicking something else for the full interview?
I enjoyed the tsncentral interview. It reminded me slightly of Point of Inquiry.
Also, James M’s posts here are brilliant. That MIT V-ism Cody gag earlier is classic.
May 14th, 2007 at 10:47 am
I aim to please.
May 18th, 2007 at 5:50 am
Off-topic: DotA definitely has a brutal learning curve. It has taken me roughly 3 years to learn many of the nuances of the game. It doesn’t make it easier that the game changes (sometimes drastically) every month or two >_
May 18th, 2007 at 5:52 am
Seems like my comment got cut off. I’ll repost:
Off-topic: DotA definitely has a brutal learning curve. It has taken me roughly 3 years to learn many of the nuances of the game. It doesn’t make it easier that the game changes (sometimes drastically) every month or two >_
May 18th, 2007 at 6:12 am
Damn it, cut off again!
Off-topic: DotA definitely has a brutal learning curve. It has taken me roughly 3 years to learn many of the nuances of the game. It doesn’t make it easier that the game changes (sometimes drastically) every month or two.
If you want to play a few games, I’d be happy to teach (or at least show) a few things about the game. I wouldn’t consider myself as good as some of the top players, but I know a lot about how the game works.
May 19th, 2007 at 3:29 am
I preferred Tides of Blood and War of Tainted Blood to DotA. It’s a shame they stopped being updated long ago.
June 19th, 2007 at 2:45 am
I can’t seem to download the audio interview fro the TSN site, nor can I find it on Google :/. Do anyone know of a mirror I could use?