Gaming on Son of Sun Tzu blog

The Lost Key

Tue, 19 Apr 2022 13:40:00 +0100

Once Upon A Time

I’ve updated a small interactive game I wrote, you can play the Lost Key game in a browser window.

There’s a feedback form at the end, but any constructive thoughts are welcome on Twitter or similar platforms where I know you.

Why?

Why a fairy story? I can save space, which helps maintain the player’s interest, because the tropes are so familiar. Also I can save time by not doing any research, because there’s very little I need to explain to the player, but also the setting is so vague. As for the “lost key” theme…

The Game Of War

Mon, 06 Sep 2021 14:30:00 +0100

Thanks to Phil Huggins for putting me onto this episode of Dan Carlin's Hardcore History.

Dan discusses his background in miniature wargaming and then talks to one of the architects of a popular Second World War themed video game about the genre, its development, growth and challenges.

Do listen if you:

Just want to listen to someone with a great podcast/radio voice. I’ve not listened to Dan Carlin before, but within 30 seconds I knew he was a professional. ( I’m reminded of meeting Dave Lewis a few years ago at BSides London )
If you want to learn more about the new WW2 video game Hell Let Loose that I mentioned a little while ago. It’s an interesting idea, especially that players are attacted to such a constrained environment compared to the popular Battle Royale format
Right now I can’t justify the time the game appears to demand, and don’t have the computer power - if you can’t either this is a really good insight.

The highlights for me:

Kriegsspiel being described as the Germans’ secret weapon in the 19th century; echos of Matt Caffrey's theories
Carlin made a good point on modern gaming taking the arguing out of miniatures, it being much better to let the computer figure it out
Maximillian Rea, the lead developer of Hell Let Loose, made a great point on modern computing finally being good enough to have massed players, and a more realistic size for the battlefield. As fun as that format this, this isn’t CoD's Nuketown
It’s the briefest of mentions, but what you can discern from the naming schemes of militaries involved in WW2.
Rea’s point that the infliction of pain isn’t the appeal for the majority of players, it’s more about strategy and tactics and out-playing an opponent. Unfortunately this interview ended just as they were getting into expanding this idea… imagine a game where your battle could be won through logistics

Weeknote 23rd August 2021

Mon, 23 Aug 2021 12:30:00 +0100

Last week

Continued thinking on a “mashup” game ( maybe manual, online, or megagame ) about the American War of Independence… but that has expanded to include a magic system
Bought a copy of the Dune board game, I’m more interested in the mechanics than the lore. If you’re interested in the lore check out Nerd Cookies on YouTube.
Discussion with a customer on running a megagame, I’ve some ideas already
I attended an online meeting of the Foster community. They’ve some very interesting ideas around tokens, there was a great Q and A, and I’m really interested to see where this goes. I do, however, think failure is as likely as success - which considering the nature of the community, I ought to write up…
My work laptop seems to handle video calls badly while doing something simultaneously, for example running OBS to obscure the background. It was useful to work through Smart Choices to determine the best way to fix the issue rather than just buy a more expensive problem. I’m not quite there yet though.
This was further evidence of the “law of repulsion”, soon after wondering if I want to spend my working life fighting technology I received a great call out of the blue
I played and enjoyed Monopoly Deal, it has an interesting mechanic, which led to a few game ideas; but similarly, some intriguing gaps in the simple rules when edge cases occur. Monopoly Bid is less good, but still an interesting game that’s quick to pick up and play.
I watched a couple of good videos on the Vietnam War on YouTube, both intriguing and horrifying
Read this short article on being an “Uncertainty Killer”, which explains what I want to achieve with my business, and why my approach needs refining

This week

While realising how useful weeknotes are in seeing what I’ve achieved, also looking at the unchanged set of plans brings home how over-ambitious I am
Still 90% done with a new layout for my company website, but still with what feels like 90% of the work left to do.
Keep fighting software, mainly rdiff-backup I expect.
Those work opportunities are still “hovering”, this is the best and worst aspect of freelancing.
Condense the scribbled set of “to do” lists next to me into one list, preferably by doing some of the things on it
Actually read a book, again
Update that Inky game, make it a little easier: Lost Key

Weeknote 16th August 2021

Mon, 16 Aug 2021 10:30:00 +0100

My further attempts at “working out loud”. I realised this should be called “weeknote”, learnt from Matt Ballantine’s latest post; I appear to be three years behind the trend.

Last week

90% done with a new layout for my company website, but still with what feels like 90% of the work left to do.
Looked for a new office chair, but I appear to be the wrong shape with the wrong height table
Apparently random things starting to fail due to age, my Xbox360 and my lower back being the most notable this week
Looked again for a new keyboard, my requirements don’t feel that unusual but I can’t find anything that matches; I’ll blog about that at some point
A few nice chats with new contacts and new customers; I appear to have been carrying out “relationship marketing” by accident over the last few years
I’m still amazed, thinking about a couple of communities I belong to, on how such smart people can under-estimate or downplay their own abilities
I’m still surprised, even after so long, on what smart and useful friends I have if I just make the time to ask them something
Ostensibly to relax, I played some Rocket League and Spellbreak for free on Nvidia’s GeForceNow service. Doing so is partly just a break, but it’s always interesting to see how well or how badly ad-hoc teams work together, I’d love to see some statistics. Similarly, I wonder how well teams co-operate in Hell Let Loose under more organised conditions.
Contined playtesting of an online game set in the Vietnam War, interesting to see how far the game has diverted from the direction I expected already

This week

Keep fighting software, mainly rdiff-backup I expect.
Those work opportunities are still “hovering”, this is the best and worst aspect of freelancing.
Condense the scribbled set of “to do” lists next to me into one list, preferably by doing some of the things on it
Actually read a book, again
Update that Inky game, make it a little easier: Lost Key

9th August 2021

Mon, 09 Aug 2021 09:00:30 +0100

Looking forward and back, 9th August 2021

I’m very wary of journals and journalling, but “work out loud” keeps being recommended more and more, and I’ve seen friends and contacts manage to navigate the line between self-promotion and bluster successfully.

Last week

Kept fighting software, won as often as I lost this week I think.
Contined playtesting of an online game set in the Vietnam War, had to change my initial plans immediately.
Continued discussions of what a general course on strategy would look like with some contacts.
Continued thinking around bots, either written in code or “card based”. These would be for my own games, or as an unauthorised addition to other’s games. But this looks like a deep area that should be a sole area of study, and I’m not sure its financially viable.
Discussions of applicability of traditional Business Continuity Management and Disaster Recovery principles to a modern organisation based on cloud services.
Had that weird freelancer thing when opportunities look bleak, and then three people contact you in the same morning ( and therefore laughed at the Law of Attraction once again ).
Moved and resized some logical volumes and re-learnt just how easy that can be.
Learnt the difference between microboredom and existential boredom: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WEQTrW9NP68
Watched Alita Battle Angel, which was underwhelming, but I was temporarily intrigued by how the sport of Motorball would work - for example, how to stop it just being a fight but on a track, what strategies teams would use, how to balance teams but allow variation, and so on… I’ve an initial idea together.
Watched Ted Lasso, still too dangerous to watch while eating.
Finally finished a little “game” in Inky: Lost Key

This week

Keep fighting software, mainly rdiff-backup I expect.
More chats with the consultancy umbrella.
Other work opportunities are “hovering”.
Try to take off more items from my “to do” lists than I add - that didn’t go so well last week.
Read a book, again

2nd August 2021

Mon, 02 Aug 2021 13:50:30 +0100

Looking forward and back, 2nd August 2021

Last week

Fought backup software - rdiff-backup - ongoing
Fixed, mostly, Manjaro blanking a screen by default
Continuing playtesting of an online game set in the Vietnam War, I particularly like the double-blind play
Being an “external security brain” for a customer
Put in some technical restrictions to stop me playing “just one more game” until too early in the morning
Mashed my sleep schedule because of how Linux handles fonts
Fought Linux and poor IO handling… still fighting
Started discussing red team thinking with a new-ish contact, I have my usual doubts that organisations are interested in this kind of service without it being bundled with many others, if at all
Continued thinking around bots, either written in code or “card based”, for either my own games, or as an unauthorised addition to other’s games. But this looks like a deep area that should be a sole area of study, and I’m not sure its financially viable
I learned that YouTube advertising is in-stream now
Spent far too long trying to make some old hardware useful
Finished all of Ape Out… at the “softer” level. If you’ve played it, you’ll know how important that last level is
Tried the Long Journey Home, an interesting idea but really dissauded by the training mode before I even started the game
Replaced some hard disks on a server like some kind of 20th Century IT version of the Sealed Knot

This week

Keep fighting rdiff-backup
More chats with the consultancy umbrella
Catch up with some old friends online
Try to take off more items from my “to do” lists than I add
Read a book, again