07-Jan-2015, 11:06 AM
Madhav,
I'm inclined to agree with Jeffrey here. It's not that I'm personally opposed to sets with MS-only or Lynx-only levels; in fact, I think those could be a great idea. But we need to turn our attention to what we have right now: a huge mound of levels that are cross-compatible. We can talk about encouraging designers to experiment and design for one ruleset all we want, but that's still not going to change what's in front of us at the moment. Again, I seem to recall that you were one of the trailblazers of cross-compatibility - you found a lot of enjoyment in the challenge of making ruleset-specific mechanisms work in both rulesets and encouraged many of us to do so as well.
And it's partially because of that encouragement that we as designers have enjoyed making cross-compatible levels in the years since.
With respect to the "vague agreement" among those who aren't with us anymore: I'm hesitant to suggest making any CCLP with levels that work only in one ruleset from this point onward. Yes, CCLP2 did this, but we have a Lynx-compatible CCLP2 now. Currently, every CCLP can be played in every ruleset in some way. I don't think it's unreasonable to position a series of level packs - CCLPs - as the general "cross-compatible" series that people can always count on working in both MS and Lynx. In other words, when a CCLP is released, players of both rulesets can come out, resting assured that they can play the same levels in both rulesets. This idea to include some ruleset-specific levels in the set is interesting, and I wouldn't mind seeing it in a future non-CCLP set, but it's rather difficult to get behind it right now when there really isn't an equal number of quality MS-only and Lynx-only levels. Perhaps the best middle ground for CCLPs would be to be a bit more lenient on "inequalities," as some have suggested. We originally started watching for these during the CCLP3 process, primarily because we wanted the set to avoid Block Buster-level discrepancies between rulesets. But having Two Sets of Rules-esque levels or little puzzles that are a tad harder in Lynx like the sokoban from Mini Challenges isn't going to hurt. Sure, it's somewhat unfortunate that designers have been primarily building levels only for a cross-compatible CCLP4. But that's what we have on the table right now. I don't think it would be nearly as much of an issue if after CCLP4, someone stepped up and laid out ideas for non-CCLP packs, perhaps in a community straw poll. If we could define what the community might want to pursue next before CCLP5, it would be much easier to encourage that variety in level design.
Furthermore, having a humongous, CCLP3-sized pool of levels to manage should not be what you sign up for as a staff member. I'm sorry to be blunt about that (and yes, my experience is somewhat colored by playing literally thousands of levels in the submission pools for the last two CCLPs), but there needs to be much more definition involved in serving on a staff with respect to how much work is involved and how long it will take - at least a ballpark estimate. Otherwise, hardly anyone will volunteer, and people will start dropping off when the set's production drags on and on and on.
I'm inclined to agree with Jeffrey here. It's not that I'm personally opposed to sets with MS-only or Lynx-only levels; in fact, I think those could be a great idea. But we need to turn our attention to what we have right now: a huge mound of levels that are cross-compatible. We can talk about encouraging designers to experiment and design for one ruleset all we want, but that's still not going to change what's in front of us at the moment. Again, I seem to recall that you were one of the trailblazers of cross-compatibility - you found a lot of enjoyment in the challenge of making ruleset-specific mechanisms work in both rulesets and encouraged many of us to do so as well.
And it's partially because of that encouragement that we as designers have enjoyed making cross-compatible levels in the years since.With respect to the "vague agreement" among those who aren't with us anymore: I'm hesitant to suggest making any CCLP with levels that work only in one ruleset from this point onward. Yes, CCLP2 did this, but we have a Lynx-compatible CCLP2 now. Currently, every CCLP can be played in every ruleset in some way. I don't think it's unreasonable to position a series of level packs - CCLPs - as the general "cross-compatible" series that people can always count on working in both MS and Lynx. In other words, when a CCLP is released, players of both rulesets can come out, resting assured that they can play the same levels in both rulesets. This idea to include some ruleset-specific levels in the set is interesting, and I wouldn't mind seeing it in a future non-CCLP set, but it's rather difficult to get behind it right now when there really isn't an equal number of quality MS-only and Lynx-only levels. Perhaps the best middle ground for CCLPs would be to be a bit more lenient on "inequalities," as some have suggested. We originally started watching for these during the CCLP3 process, primarily because we wanted the set to avoid Block Buster-level discrepancies between rulesets. But having Two Sets of Rules-esque levels or little puzzles that are a tad harder in Lynx like the sokoban from Mini Challenges isn't going to hurt. Sure, it's somewhat unfortunate that designers have been primarily building levels only for a cross-compatible CCLP4. But that's what we have on the table right now. I don't think it would be nearly as much of an issue if after CCLP4, someone stepped up and laid out ideas for non-CCLP packs, perhaps in a community straw poll. If we could define what the community might want to pursue next before CCLP5, it would be much easier to encourage that variety in level design.
Furthermore, having a humongous, CCLP3-sized pool of levels to manage should not be what you sign up for as a staff member. I'm sorry to be blunt about that (and yes, my experience is somewhat colored by playing literally thousands of levels in the submission pools for the last two CCLPs), but there needs to be much more definition involved in serving on a staff with respect to how much work is involved and how long it will take - at least a ballpark estimate. Otherwise, hardly anyone will volunteer, and people will start dropping off when the set's production drags on and on and on.