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Old 06-17-2009, 08:11 PM   #8
noodles
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Re: Has anyone ever used this system?

The MUD-Dev mailing list used to be a great place for discussion of topics like this. Indeed, this very topic was discussed many times during the heyday of MUD development. Nowadays, MUD-Dev is stagnant, but the older posts are a goldmine of ideas and notes on/for this kind of system.

Here's some related threads, which I have kindly interpreted a summary of for you:
: Started by someone who has a pretty decent generation system at their disposal, with detail on how it operates. It sounds very nice and employs some of the best concepts like in-game places and entities objects being database objects, that can be factored into the quests. It also scales the difficulty according to the player doing the quest (a feature of the computer game Oblivion that I personally found immersion breaking). A pointers to a previous thread is given (these posts seem to be missing from this archive of the list but may be found in another) and a comparison made between the approaches.

: Differentiates between static quests and dynamic quests. Supporting game systems to facilitate player awareness of quests they are engaged in. Involvement of in-game resources. Use of scripting languages and programming approaches including triggers.

: Thoughts on factoring story and plot into generated quests. Use of overarching plots. Involvement of in-game entities. A personal preference for manual systems and thoughts on rewards that appeal to a player. Believable responses by the game world to the side-effects of dynamic quests.

: The initial post of this thread is missing from the archives. Starts with the topic of keeping quests generated by a dynamic quest system fresh and interesting, and avoiding them eventually becoming stale. Making quests robust in the presence of gameplay concurrency - that is the interaction of other players in the resources involved in the quest. Possibility of generating quests for different players that compete against each other.

: Starts off slow, then veers towards noting Chris Crawford's what is now named StoryTron system. Also links to his essay "Interactivity, Plot, Free Will, Determinism, Quantum Mechanics, and Temporal Irreversibility." Mention of a proof that "interesting stories are not computable, therefore cannot be generated." Disagreement about this proof. More missing posts from this archive. Thoughts on designer tools taking care of the low-level details.
It's quite inspirational to read through this. While there are some posters in there who have written their own system, speculating about the possibilities is to some degree navel gazing. The real knowledge is in having implemented it and seeing where you can take it, and what changes you have to make to get there.
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