Again, I wonder sometimes about the SimCity AI computation.
I think one of the hardest lessons for most designers to learn is restraint. So many times my firm will get into trouble because we love to design till the cows come home. We keep revising and adding and scrapping and adding and revising. We love designing soooooo much that our projects run over budget and we dangerously push the limits of our project schedule. Don't get me wrong... our designs are always of the finest quality. Apparantly we thrive in tight situations though.
I think all of us fell into this trap in our initial cities. It was the desire to build the bestest greatest city and a genuine love of designing.
Restraint. It's not just a river in Egypt.
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Point taken. I have since removed mention of my firm.
I also didn't want to sound like I was harshly criticizing my firm alone. These were general statements about designers, backed up by my experience with my firm.
That's the second time someone has brought up GTA to me in the context of architectural education.
I love both this game and that one, but I'm not sure what the cross between the two would look like.
I just read an article entitled "Grand Theft Education" - I will post it to the workshop blog later today.
I actually have never played GTA.
I am however, extremely eager for the release of "Spore" - Will Wright's next game. To be released either Q4/2006 or Q1/2007. That will be the game of focus for the next iteration of this workshop.
But your initial post is a point well taken. We (designers) love to tinker. Is it to acheive a better 'product' or is it the intellecutal engagement of the 'process'?
The second-most difficult lesson for designers to learn is how to be "open". And by "open" I mean being able (and comfortable) to explain why/how they made decisions.
I just looked up "Spore". That seemse intense!
I was hooked on Sim games since playing the original SimCity many many years ago, and continued to play its later iterations. I love The Sims also, but more for the design aspect of creating your own "dreamhouse." The only problem I had with the game intent is it felt TOO micromanaging. I hate the fact that I need to make my Sims pee or else they wet the floor.
Is Spore just continuing in this way?
And to try and relate this post back to the original blog... isn't micromanagement just another form of lack of restraint? I understand that we as designers should make concious decisions in every detail. But when is enough enough?
I think it is. For your species to continue to survive, you need to make them breed. You esstentially have to teach/learn them everything. It starts with developing single-cell organisms and goes through developing space technologies. It might have to be a super-workshop.
When is enough enough? Hmmm ... two business terms to draw inspiration from - (1) ROI or Return On Investment: does the required capital provide a substantial enough widget to make it a worthwhile endeavor and (2) LODR or Law of Diminishing Returns: each time you reconsider something or put capital into something the likelihood is that the end result with be less and less. Regardless of which rule of business you choose to abide by, it requires a judgement call ... is this important (to spend my time on)? This needs to be answered in light of what the levels/hierarchy of importance.
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