Edward Castronova reveals lessons learned from Arden
Filed under: Historical, Game mechanics, MMO industry, Tips and tricks, Opinion, Free-to-play, Arden, Academic, Virtual worlds
As you may recall, Edward Castronova, professor at Indiana University and researcher of virtual world economics, had been developing a Shakespeare-based MMO, only to close it down because, in his words, 'It's no fun. We failed to design a gripping experience.'In the current issue of Wired, Castronova offers his '5 tips for making games that don't suck', based on his experience. To summarize:
- Don't assume it's easy, even if you have a great idea
- Start small -- you don't need a huge development studio to flesh out your basic gameplay concepts
- Know your audience -- apparently the game-playing world isn't ready for an MMO where the strongest attack is a triple-level pun
- Hire developers who can focus on the job, not students who had educational deadlines to pursue
- Admit when it's going south
[Via Wired (print edition)]
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Animagnum said on 12:25PM 3-23-2008
He's not kidding -- I can assure you of that!
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