Original Post
This email arrived in my inbox tonight. If anyone wants to pick it up give me a shout and I'll toss you his contact info.
Sup, my name's Victor Palmer, and I'm CEO of a company called SCI. We do some interesting work on developing /meta-games/ (or games about games, see below), and I was wondering if you guys would be interested in setting up an interview so that we could share some of our techniques with your readers. Just a brief introduction, I am an ex-Electronic Arts employee ... just finished working on their Godfather project as a next-gen engineer. Haha, actually, interesting fact, I got an image-of-the-day posted on your website that I'm pretty sure landed me that Godfather job back in 2005 ... it dealt with fluid simulation, but I don't think the archive goes that far back. Anyway, meta-games are used for a lot of things in modern games ...the Godfather is a great example. For a LOT of classified reasons, the engine in that game turned out VERY poorly. It consisted of nothing more than being able to perform a variety of finishing moves on in-game characters. Not very compelling. So Bing Gordon decided that the game would not consist of the engine, which sucked, but of a series of 'meta-games' ... for example, the final game had the 'meta-game' where you tried to gain the most respect with the various mob families, the 'meta-game' where you tried to be as lawful as possible (lest the police arrest you), the 'meta-game' where you tried to get clothes that looked cool, etc. Basically, the 'meta-games' that were added on to the engine MADE the game. Not that the game was a huge success, but the meta-games really did save that game. Not to harp on this, but the BEST example of an EA meta-game based game is SimCity … not many people know this, but the engine in SimCity was laughably simple. It was the interplay of the various ‘meta-games’ that made that game … the ‘meta-game’ where you tried not to get impeached, the ‘meta-game’ where you tried to encourage business growth, etc. I'll wrap this up ... fast forward a few years, my company, SCI, has made what may be the meta-game of all time. It’s a web-based system that lets players place bets (as in gambling bets) for real money on the outcome of first-person shooter games such as Counter-Strike, etc. haha .. you heard me right! :) We don't have time for the 'legal issues' question in this email. :) But that's a story unto itself. Bottom line, we've created this web-based meta-game (www.gamersbet.net <http://www.gamersbet.net/>) that people can use to play games for money. For example, let’s say that "I bet you $5 that Player X will beat Player Y in a deathmatch on Z server". Obviously, after I make that bet I'm going to join the game that Player X and Player Y are playing and try to help Player X beat Player Y so that I can win the bet ... in essence, I'm participating in a meta-game (for money!) that I created by placing my bet. What I'd like to talk about is various techniques that game developers use to design meta-games and make sure that player behaviors conform to desirable patterns. The nice thing about meta-games is that they tend to be fairly easy to analyze, and by the use of a branch of mathematics known as ‘game theory’, you can really nail down how the introduction of a given meta-game will affect player behavior ... we've certainly had to use game-theory techniques to make sure that our betting system produced the player behavior that WE wanted. Anyway, sorry for the gargantuan email, but I must admit, I'm a huge fan of the site (haha ... I really do think you guys got me my first job in the industry) ... and I'd LOVE to discuss meta-games with your readers. PLEASE let me know what you think about this ... - Thanks! Victor Palmer CEO SCI
Sup, my name's Victor Palmer, and I'm CEO of a company called SCI. We do some interesting work on developing /meta-games/ (or games about games, see below), and I was wondering if you guys would be interested in setting up an interview so that we could share some of our techniques with your readers. Just a brief introduction, I am an ex-Electronic Arts employee ... just finished working on their Godfather project as a next-gen engineer. Haha, actually, interesting fact, I got an image-of-the-day posted on your website that I'm pretty sure landed me that Godfather job back in 2005 ... it dealt with fluid simulation, but I don't think the archive goes that far back. Anyway, meta-games are used for a lot of things in modern games ...the Godfather is a great example. For a LOT of classified reasons, the engine in that game turned out VERY poorly. It consisted of nothing more than being able to perform a variety of finishing moves on in-game characters. Not very compelling. So Bing Gordon decided that the game would not consist of the engine, which sucked, but of a series of 'meta-games' ... for example, the final game had the 'meta-game' where you tried to gain the most respect with the various mob families, the 'meta-game' where you tried to be as lawful as possible (lest the police arrest you), the 'meta-game' where you tried to get clothes that looked cool, etc. Basically, the 'meta-games' that were added on to the engine MADE the game. Not that the game was a huge success, but the meta-games really did save that game. Not to harp on this, but the BEST example of an EA meta-game based game is SimCity … not many people know this, but the engine in SimCity was laughably simple. It was the interplay of the various ‘meta-games’ that made that game … the ‘meta-game’ where you tried not to get impeached, the ‘meta-game’ where you tried to encourage business growth, etc. I'll wrap this up ... fast forward a few years, my company, SCI, has made what may be the meta-game of all time. It’s a web-based system that lets players place bets (as in gambling bets) for real money on the outcome of first-person shooter games such as Counter-Strike, etc. haha .. you heard me right! :) We don't have time for the 'legal issues' question in this email. :) But that's a story unto itself. Bottom line, we've created this web-based meta-game (www.gamersbet.net <http://www.gamersbet.net/>) that people can use to play games for money. For example, let’s say that "I bet you $5 that Player X will beat Player Y in a deathmatch on Z server". Obviously, after I make that bet I'm going to join the game that Player X and Player Y are playing and try to help Player X beat Player Y so that I can win the bet ... in essence, I'm participating in a meta-game (for money!) that I created by placing my bet. What I'd like to talk about is various techniques that game developers use to design meta-games and make sure that player behaviors conform to desirable patterns. The nice thing about meta-games is that they tend to be fairly easy to analyze, and by the use of a branch of mathematics known as ‘game theory’, you can really nail down how the introduction of a given meta-game will affect player behavior ... we've certainly had to use game-theory techniques to make sure that our betting system produced the player behavior that WE wanted. Anyway, sorry for the gargantuan email, but I must admit, I'm a huge fan of the site (haha ... I really do think you guys got me my first job in the industry) ... and I'd LOVE to discuss meta-games with your readers. PLEASE let me know what you think about this ... - Thanks! Victor Palmer CEO SCI
