Nick;
and then forgetting the primary examples. They were discussed on the
> livecode list a few years back, but couldn't find them from a hunt of the
> archives. Does this jog anyone's memory?
>
>
Yeah, I mentioned those in the Glassbeadgame discussion.
First of all there is Nomic (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nomic ) which is
a game where when it's your turn you have to create and propose a rules
change or amendment which is then voted on by all players. It's largely
based on the structure of Western law& politics and makes clear how those
too are self-referential (politicians should abide by the law as well). The
text to go to here is by Douglas Hofstadter in his book "Metamagical
Themas", that book is a all-round worthwhile purchase for list-members.
There is a lot of stuff there about creativity, structure and rules. Nomic
could be seen as a sort of conceptual work, a note on the nature of politics
but I recommend actually playing it once. I suggest keeping a laptop at hand
for convenient centralised book-keeping.
Then, more modern, more commercial (well; it's for sale) and far more
accessible there is Fluxx (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fluxx ). Fluxx is a
card-game that can be picked up in 3 or so minutes; the rules in the
beginning are that when it's your turn you draw one card and play one card.
That's all of the rules at that point. If you want more rules you'll have to
play "new rule" cards, when you'd like to win you'll have to play a "goal"
card. The game normally only has one goal, but of course you can change the
rules to allow for more goals. These days there are quite a few variations
(like a zombie themed one) but list members will probably be more interested
in the packs of blank cards that better stocked game stores have. Very
charming game in that non-nerds will pick it up and have fun yet it still
shows that it was created by a ex-NASA asm coder. Some rounds will be
borderline random, at other times you can win through a carefully planned
chain-reaction. There's a online version that's free to play but I think
it's more fun to create your own new cards and play with friends. The meta
game quickly becomes winning by being the one to pay most attention but of
course that can easily be subverted with some new cards that reference -say-
drinks.
Then there is this, which I believe Fluxx is based on;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1000_Blank_White_Cards
I didn't document it but during the #slackpact/ #hackpact month I
experimented with writing "add a new rule at the bottom and pass the notepad
on" on the first page of a blank notepad at a birthday party and passing it
on. Results were somewhat amusing (it was quite interesting how some players
felt the urge to write in pseudo-code). The session ended fairly quickly in
a system-crash due to intentionally illegible instructions. I think Luc also
added a dirty picture. When I try this again I won't start at the top of the
page and use a single long sheet of paper; it turned out to be quite
interesting to add conditions at the top of the page, affecting the first
rule. This "game" requires 0 preparation and explanation but more than Nomic
it depends on the goodwill of the players.
That's the basics of the stuff that was mentioned, I think.
Happy playing (oh, how I love the double meaning of that word)
Kas.
Received on Sat Nov 07 2009 - 17:53:15 GMT