This is why when we post comments in people's blogs, we don't jump to conclusions about what they're trying to communicate. ;) Don't blame me for your false interpretation of One True Wayism in my post. Moving on...
I don't know why you're hammering Authorial Intent. It really wasn't on this diagram at all. All the picture shows is the Designer's understanding of his own rules text and how it may or may not match up with the player's understanding of the same rules text.
But let me address your comment. I think it's splitting hairs to separate the designer's intent from the designer's act (of writing). I think Authorial Intent is less useful than Authorial Understanding, in any case. I intend Verge to play a certain way but I haven't figured out how to do it yet; I understand Verge to play a different way, but it's not yet a publishable thing. When I publish it, my intent may still differ from my understanding of it, but my understanding should at least provide fun reliably.
I don't think designers intend to suck, but they may be under deadline pressures or just not care enough to ensure they don't suck. They may publish games they understand to suck but not intend them to suck.
Mainly I keep hammering on Authorial Intent (or even Understanding, frankly) because it really is hugely orthagonal to the presence of fun in play. Honest, completely unrelated. What is not unrelated are the Rules - but they constitute an entity in and of themselves after publication and the author is no longer in the picture.
As much as it would satisfy my authorial hubris to say that what I understood and what I wanted make a difference to how and if people have fun with my Rules, it just ain’t so. The mindspace that I was in, my intentions, my understanding of my own machine is completely immaterial to whether folks get good play out of it. The real question is whether the Rules as received by the players facilitate their fun. If you want to maximize that liklihood and speed it to occurance, you have to forget the author (even if that author is yourself) and write something that looks at the players first.
The difference between, say, FATAL and GURPS is that FATAL is all about the author and his intent and GURPS is about writing for the group to have fun with it. And I say that as someone who doesn’t even like GURPS!
Yes, but the process of game design is all about translating intent into rules and communicating intent to players so they can play the same game you play.
You are hammering this point about how intent doesn't matter to play, and I agree. Intent matters to design, and design matters to play. That's the point I'm making here.
Here's an (absurd) example of how my design intent fucks up your fun: I write a game called Hahaha. It is 32 pages long and contains only the words "ha ha ha ha" repeated the entire length of the document. I somehow manage to get you to pay $32 for it. My intent was to rip you off for $32 and to make sure you have a lousy time. Now, you're gonna have a really hard time having fun playing that game in any meaningful way. Tell me that my intent has no bearing on your fun.
Tell me that my intent has no bearing on your fun.
It is certainly within the realm of possibility that I “get” the joke, find it hillarious, and start showing it to my friends with whom I get a big, snortin’ chortle. That’s totally not your intention as stated, but your intention doesn’t end up impacting our fun. It’s orthagonal.
I don't know why you're hammering Authorial Intent. It really wasn't on this diagram at all. All the picture shows is the Designer's understanding of his own rules text and how it may or may not match up with the player's understanding of the same rules text.
But let me address your comment. I think it's splitting hairs to separate the designer's intent from the designer's act (of writing). I think Authorial Intent is less useful than Authorial Understanding, in any case. I intend Verge to play a certain way but I haven't figured out how to do it yet; I understand Verge to play a different way, but it's not yet a publishable thing. When I publish it, my intent may still differ from my understanding of it, but my understanding should at least provide fun reliably.
I don't think designers intend to suck, but they may be under deadline pressures or just not care enough to ensure they don't suck. They may publish games they understand to suck but not intend them to suck.
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Mainly I keep hammering on Authorial Intent (or even Understanding, frankly) because it really is hugely orthagonal to the presence of fun in play. Honest, completely unrelated. What is not unrelated are the Rules - but they constitute an entity in and of themselves after publication and the author is no longer in the picture.
As much as it would satisfy my authorial hubris to say that what I understood and what I wanted make a difference to how and if people have fun with my Rules, it just ain’t so. The mindspace that I was in, my intentions, my understanding of my own machine is completely immaterial to whether folks get good play out of it. The real question is whether the Rules as received by the players facilitate their fun. If you want to maximize that liklihood and speed it to occurance, you have to forget the author (even if that author is yourself) and write something that looks at the players first.
The difference between, say, FATAL and GURPS is that FATAL is all about the author and his intent and GURPS is about writing for the group to have fun with it. And I say that as someone who doesn’t even like GURPS!
Reply
You are hammering this point about how intent doesn't matter to play, and I agree. Intent matters to design, and design matters to play. That's the point I'm making here.
Here's an (absurd) example of how my design intent fucks up your fun: I write a game called Hahaha. It is 32 pages long and contains only the words "ha ha ha ha" repeated the entire length of the document. I somehow manage to get you to pay $32 for it. My intent was to rip you off for $32 and to make sure you have a lousy time. Now, you're gonna have a really hard time having fun playing that game in any meaningful way. Tell me that my intent has no bearing on your fun.
Reply
Tell me that my intent has no bearing on your fun.
It is certainly within the realm of possibility that I “get” the joke, find it hillarious, and start showing it to my friends with whom I get a big, snortin’ chortle. That’s totally not your intention as stated, but your intention doesn’t end up impacting our fun. It’s orthagonal.
Reply
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