An idea for a game I had as a kid before I realized such limitations existed was a game where you start from the earliest parts of prehistory, and you are Death. The Grim Reaper. Shinigami. HE WHO TALKS LIKE THIS. However you want to slice it.
From the beginning, you decide who lives and who dies, and the manner of their demise; your choices would influence the course of history not only based on who is left living, but also the way that people died would influence future cultural or historical or societal developments. For example, a beloved public figure dying of cholera might encourage more medical research.
Possibly, advances in medical technology or safety measures could thwart or balk you, although I would prefer to take the angle that death can never be denied and is inevitable.
This would not work as a video game because there would simply be too many branching timeline possibilities for one, and for two, there's not really a win state. It would be more like a sandbox or ant farm.
Semiosis and Interference by Sue Burke were my last two, but while interesting they didn't go in the way I thought, and it feels like there's a big hunk of... I hesitate to say wasted, but certainly unrealized potential. At the same time I feel like my expectations or preconceptions about what could or ought to happen are causing me to miss the point that Burke is trying to make.
I have so far bounced off the third and final entry in the series, Usurpation, but I have faith in both it and me and will take another crack at it soon.
It would probably take some massive PE/VC enforced changes at Valve where they start to enshittify Steam and the loss of confidence in the platform that will follow to make the other platforms competitive.
Make no mistake, it's coming eventually. I held off on trusting discord for years buy finally they won me over. Now look where we are.
It is not to my tastes anymore, but at the time when I was very swept up in it, it was truly an immersive and transformative experience. As a piece of art, I feel that it was a tremendous success.
An idea for a game I had as a kid before I realized such limitations existed was a game where you start from the earliest parts of prehistory, and you are Death. The Grim Reaper. Shinigami. HE WHO TALKS LIKE THIS. However you want to slice it.
From the beginning, you decide who lives and who dies, and the manner of their demise; your choices would influence the course of history not only based on who is left living, but also the way that people died would influence future cultural or historical or societal developments. For example, a beloved public figure dying of cholera might encourage more medical research.
Possibly, advances in medical technology or safety measures could thwart or balk you, although I would prefer to take the angle that death can never be denied and is inevitable.
This would not work as a video game because there would simply be too many branching timeline possibilities for one, and for two, there's not really a win state. It would be more like a sandbox or ant farm.