> The thing is, all that is _boring_. If there is no scarcity, there is no progression.

That's just false. One of the most popular games in human history, Minecraft, completely destroys this notion. Every resource is infinitely renewable and available in great supply.

> This can be OK if there is other sources of conflict like in Kerbal Space Program sandbox mode where you have an unlimited amount of parts and Kerbals to build with but you have to overcome environmental challenges inherent in flying a ship to another planet and back.

This sentence seems contradictory. The challenge is in the doing of a thing. That's not conflict OR scarcity, it's simply your experience. And it's a fun and famous game with a huge following.

> If there is no conflict of any kind there is nothing preventing you from achieving your goal immediately without having to do much of anything, which isn't exactly very fun.

This is that "cultural lens" thing I've referred to in other posts. You're defining this as conflict, but it's not really conflict. It's overcoming hardship. The way you define this matters for how you think about it.

> Very few people want to play "games" that are solely experiencing the environment with no real goals.

So I submit the majority of gaming time on the most popular gaming platforms (mobile) are in fact exactly like this. There is no forced conflict in Neko Atsume or Candy Crush Saga. Roguelike games do model violence conflict, but largely do away with specific goals and simply let you revel in an environment that is new and surprising each time.

> Because (most) people need to have goals to work towards both in real life and in games.

Why does this require repeated and somewhat authentic modeling of fatal violence?

> If you don't give a player goals

I'm trying to work out how you're immediately equating "slaughter each other in PUBG while rolling around in a jeep for now reason" is "goals" but "build a pyramid with your friends in minecraft" is not. In terms of hours and copies sold, the later absolutely annihilates the former, and yet here you are arguing that the former is the only fun option.

>That's just false. One of the most popular games in human history, Minecraft, completely destroys this notion. Every resource is infinitely renewable and available in great supply.

One of, if not the, most popular modes in Minecraft involves scarcity, rare materials being found near monsters, and requiring you go to what is basically the christian idea of Hell to retrieve them.

> One of, if not the, most popular modes in Minecraft involves scarcity, rare materials being found near monsters, and requiring you go to what is basically the christian idea of Hell to retrieve them.

So, I've logged thousands of hours of Minecraft and recorded and sold hundreds of hours. Everything in Minecraft is trivially renewable. It's easy to get. The core resource scarcity of minecraft is an hour of so of gating. People's predilections towards activity have way more to do than any scarcity.

There are robotic antagonists, but they're clearly not human. There is PvP, but it's window dressing to the building. And uh, I don't think the Nether is very much like Hell at all.

There is a difference between Overwatch or Dota2 and Minecraft. In Minecraft, you do something else and sometimes fight others. In the others, you fight others and might occasionally do something else.

> That's just false. One of the most popular games in human history, Minecraft, completely destroys this notion. Every resource is infinitely renewable and available in great supply.

You completely ignored this:

> Very few people want to play "games" that are solely experiencing the environment with no real goals. The only games I can think of that are like that are sandbox games like Minecraft, and TBH I don't think sandbox Minecraft really counts as a game anymore than building a stick fort does in real life.

I don't really consider sandbox Minecraft a game any more than building something out of Legos or a stick fort in the woods is a game. Is it fun? Yes! Is it creative? Yes! Is it a game? I would say no.

>> This can be OK if there is other sources of conflict like in Kerbal Space Program sandbox mode where you have an unlimited amount of parts and Kerbals to build with but you have to overcome environmental challenges inherent in flying a ship to another planet and back.

> This sentence seems contradictory. The challenge is in the doing of a thing. That's not conflict OR scarcity, it's simply your experience. And it's a fun and famous game with a huge following.

The challenge is the conflict with the environment. Maybe you don't view this as conflict, but the prevalence of "Man vs. Nature" as a kind of conflict is huge in Western culture.

The scarcity in KSP only comes into play in science mode (science points that you need to unlock technology is a scarce resource) and career mode (science points + money to build your rockets is a scarce resource)

>> Very few people want to play "games" that are solely experiencing the environment with no real goals.

> So I submit the majority of gaming time on the most popular gaming platforms (mobile) are in fact exactly like this. There is no forced conflict in Neko Atsume or Candy Crush Saga. Roguelike games do model violence conflict, but largely do away with specific goals and simply let you revel in an environment that is new and surprising each time.

Goals != person on person conflict. In Candy Crush you are trying to complete a level that is designed to make that a hard task (Man vs Nature where the level is the "nature"). I haven't heard of Neko Atsume so I can't comment on that.

For rougelikes, isn't the goal often to beat the end boss? Obviously the journey has to be fun or people won't play, but they still have a goal or give you enough space and tools to let you define your own.

>> Because (most) people need to have goals to work towards both in real life and in games.

>Why does this require repeated and somewhat authentic modeling of fatal violence?

Again, goals != person on person conflict. Conflict != person on person conflict. I personally can't stand games with authentic person on person violence, but I love games like Celeste where the goal is to climb the mountain and you have to face many kinds of conflict (Man vs themself, Man vs Man, and Man vs Nature)

>> If you don't give a player goals

> I'm trying to work out how you're immediately equating "slaughter each other in PUBG while rolling around in a jeep for now reason" is "goals" but "build a pyramid with your friends in minecraft" is not. In terms of hours and copies sold, the later absolutely annihilates the former, and yet here you are arguing that the former is the only fun option.

PUBG has a very clear goal: Be the last person alive by any means necessary. You may not find that fun. I know I don't. But it is still a goal, and considering how popular it is a goal that many people find fun to achieve.

Building a pyramid in Minecraft is a self imposed goal, there is nothing about Minecraft that says "you must build a pyramid to win." Again, I view sandbox Minecraft as a building toy like a box of Lego bricks, not a game in the traditional sense. Also, you are completely ignoring survival mode which hey what a surprise features conflict between the player and the environment (creatures that want to kill you) and sometimes conflict between players.

I'm not saying that the former is the only fun option. I'm just saying that for a game to be fun it needs to let the player have goals to work towards and some kind of conflict (NOT necessary person on person conflict) that makes the player work to achieve their goals. Would Mario Bros. be fun if there was no enemies to avoid or defeat and the level was just a strait line from the start to the goal with no obstacles in between?

>I don't really consider sandbox Minecraft a game any more than building something out of Legos or a stick fort in the woods is a game. Is it fun? Yes! Is it creative? Yes! Is it a game? I would say no.

The definition of a game isn't easy. Academics have struggled with it for a while now.

Some people would call Minecraft a game. While other people would say it's more a system for developing your own games.

> I don't really consider sandbox Minecraft a game any more than building something out of Legos or a stick fort in the woods is a game. Is it fun? Yes! Is it creative? Yes! Is it a game? I would say no.

So now kids playing with legos isn't a game becuase it lacks conflict? ... That's... not a very realistic definition in my book.

> The scarcity in KSP only comes into play in science mode (science points that you need to unlock technology is a scarce resource) and career mode (science points + money to build your rockets is a scarce resource)

There is a scarcity mode if you want it, yes. But it's not exactly actual scarcity. It's more like, "You just need to wait longer to do action X." There aren't hard choices to be made nor are there ever dead ends from those choices.

> Goals != person on person conflict. In Candy Crush you are trying to complete a level that is designed to make that a hard task (Man vs Nature where the level is the "nature"). I haven't heard of Neko Atsume so I can't comment on that.

Even the words you're using are begging the question. Is that lens of "man vs ____" actually a valid one? Why? The designer isn't trying to actually be in conflict with users. Candy Crush isn't trying to make levels hard. They're trying to make them fun.

> For rougelikes, isn't the goal often to beat the end boss? Obviously the journey has to be fun or people won't play, but they still have a goal or give you enough space and tools to let you define your own.

Not really? Lost of the famous ones have a goal that is not "kill a thing" but rather "escape with an object" which is always harder. Rogue never had an end. Nethack has you escape with an item; actually fighting the Wizard of Yendor is a waste of resources. Dead Cells has tons of endings and a few don't even involve final bosses.

> Building a pyramid in Minecraft is a self imposed goal, there is nothing about Minecraft that says "you must build a pyramid to win." Again, I view sandbox Minecraft as a building toy like a box of Lego bricks, not a game in the traditional sense. Also, you are completely ignoring survival mode which hey what a surprise features conflict between the player and the environment (creatures that want to kill you) and sometimes conflict between players.

Well this is another subtle cultural perspective, isn't it? Success, PUBG and Fortnite's Battle Royale posit, come from external validation. You have to want both the validation and agree that getting it is an accomplishment. I can see how folks like trying to make this perspective appealing to kids, but it's not really a reflection of reality nor the human psyche. There are an unlimited number of kinds of external validation we all ignore.

> . I'm just saying that for a game to be fun it needs to let the player have goals to work towards and some kind of conflict (NOT necessary person on person conflict) that makes the player work to achieve their goals

With all respect: I think you want to say this but in fact your words betray you. Your first instinct for game conflict is violence. I somewhat agree with the point you've made, but I want to point out how your worldview undermines that point.

>> I don't really consider sandbox Minecraft a game any more than building something out of Legos or a stick fort in the woods is a game. Is it fun? Yes! Is it creative? Yes! Is it a game? I would say no.

>So now kids playing with legos isn't a game becuase it lacks conflict? ... That's... not a very realistic definition in my book.

I have _never_ heard anyone call building with Legos a game. Heck, Lego themselves made a theme called "Lego Games" where you built games to play with out of Legos! This wouldn't make very much sense if they considered Legos themselves to be a game. So yes, I wouldn't call building with Legos a game, I would say that it is playing with a toy. In the same spirit I would say playing sandbox Minecraft is playing with a virtual toy.

> There is a scarcity mode if you want it, yes. But it's not exactly actual scarcity. It's more like, "You just need to wait longer to do action X." There aren't hard choices to be made nor are there ever dead ends from those choices.

OK, I must have misunderstood what you meant by scarcity. I took it to mean that you have no limits on your resources, not that it had to be very difficult to obtain those resources and that there had to be a finite amount of them to allow dead ends.

>> For rougelikes, isn't the goal often to beat the end boss? Obviously the journey has to be fun or people won't play, but they still have a goal or give you enough space and tools to let you define your own.

> Not really? Lost of the famous ones have a goal that is not "kill a thing" but rather "escape with an object" which is always harder. Rogue never had an end. Nethack has you escape with an item; actually fighting the Wizard of Yendor is a waste of resources. Dead Cells has tons of endings and a few don't even involve final bosses.

As you can probably tell I haven't played many rougelikes so thanks for showing me that they are a lot more diverse than I thought. However, I would still say that they all have conflict, just not always violent conflict.

> Well this is another subtle cultural perspective, isn't it? Success, PUBG and Fortnite's Battle Royale posit, come from external validation. You have to want both the validation and agree that getting it is an accomplishment.

Not really? Success is winning a round. There is nothing external in that. _Wanting_ to win a round of PUBG can be external (although I wouldn't agree that it has to be, lots of people just find that kind of game fun) but actually winning a round of PUBG isn't.

>> . I'm just saying that for a game to be fun it needs to let the player have goals to work towards and some kind of conflict (NOT necessary person on person conflict) that makes the player work to achieve their goals

>With all respect: I think you want to say this but in fact your words betray you. Your first instinct for game conflict is violence. I somewhat agree with the point you've made, but I want to point out how your worldview undermines that point.

Wow, I guess I've been lying to myself all these years about how I don't like graphic violence or gore in games or movies. Thanks for telling me my true self internet stranger! /s

But seriously, I've said multiple times that I don't like those kind of games. Battlefield, PubG, Fortnight, and all the other person on person combat/battle games could have never been made and I would be perfectly happy. If you think I'm lying that's fine, but I'm not going to continue to discuss this if that's the case.