GDC 2009, Day Two

Today's day two here at GDC. Everyone I've met so far says they expected me to be taller. SURPRISE, I AM SHORT! Crucially!

So let's catch up on yesterday -- do you guys remember last year at GDC I chaired and ran the Worlds in Motion Summit? At that time I was editor of Gamasutra's sister online worlds site, WorldsinMotion.biz. I don't run the summit or edit the site anymore -- site edit duties now fall to my pal the wonderful Scotsman Mathew Kumar, who contrary to what Gillen said on our drunk podcast does not smell.

Anyway. You might remember that around that time, when I was working in that space a lot, I used to blab on about how I liked the idea of user-driven, open-ended social worlds -- because I really lamented the lack of genuine socialization in strictly-game MMOs. That MMOs have their own cultural lexicon, albeit an odd one, is a topic for another time, but the point is that one of my personal soapboxes became the idea that social worlds could learn from game mechanics, and vice versa.

Yesterday I saw a talk by lead designer Sulka Haro from Sulake. They make Habbo, that avatar-driven social world for tweens/teens. Probably it's not the kind of thing that the audience that reads this blog would be into, but Habbo users just love it -- Haro dropped some numbers and let us know the site sees 11.5 million unique users a month in over 30 territories. Amazing!

I was glad to hear him talk about how socialization alone isn't enough to compel people to stick with an online world, no matter how compelling it seems at first. Let's say you take several weeks off from playing, for example -- when you get back, you've got a steep hill ahead of you in terms of getting re-oriented, getting to know how the climate has changed, and stuff like that. In effect, it could even be like being a new user all over again, and that's a barrier. (Incidentally, this is why I don't like Animal Crossing -- that it can all go to shit if you stop playing seems like too much of a penalty to me.)

The free-to-play space is so competitive that user retention becomes a major issue. He talked about how implementing what essentially amounts to game mechanics -- encouraging goal-oriented behavior, implementing Achievements-type rewards -- helps users stick to a world like Habbo.

I covered his talk, so check it out here if it's your thing. My favorite part was when he shared all the user feedback they initially received to the new mechanics. Basically, everybody absolutely hated it at first, but once they had just a few months to adjust and get comfortable with it, not only did most of the users report that they loved using some of the new game systems, but they'd even personalized them in ways the designers hadn't expected.

It was really interesting! Say what you want about kids' virtual worlds -- Lord knows I sure do -- but Habbo is really paving a road here. You don't have to play it, but you should keep up on what's going on with it.

Yesterday I also went to see Masaya Matsuura showing his new Major Minor's Majestic March, which launches on Wii today. Getting to talk to him was kind of a big deal, and I really hope I didn't embarrass myself too much with my exciteable, super-long questions. He talked about the game, the example he wants to set for the rhythm genre, and since everyone on Twitter told me to ask him if there'll ever be more Parappa, I did that. He's probably heard that question a million times, so I blamed you all for making me ask. Yay! Here's the interview.

Other stuff that happened yesterday: I pounced Raph Koster, got lipstick on Ian Bogost, met the very cool dudes from Capybara who make one of my favorite iPhone games Critter Crunch, saw fellow journo-friends Stephen Totilo and Evan Narcisse plus pals and former coworkers Brian Crecente and Mike McWhertor, I enthused semi-drunkenly to Metanet's Raigan and Mare, and lots of other fun.

Wish you were here, and stuff! This city's streets are freakishly clean, by the way. Like, Stepford Wives or something. And because I am so short I am close enough to the sidewalk to tell. Can you tell I'm running on tons of coffee? Next up: The Independent Games Festival Mobile, to start. More throughout the day on my Twitter, if that's your bag. More GDC madness than you can shake a stick at!

Tweet