I really like cohabitive games. I enjoy playing this one. I’m somewhat mixed on this post in particular being in the Best Of LessWrong collection. Cohabitive Games So Far looks like it’s doing two things; it’s outlining what a cohabitive game is and why it’s interesting, and it’s describing one specific cohabitive game but not in enough detail to play it.
For the first part (outlining what a cohabitive game is and why it’s interesting) I prefer Competitive, Cooperative, and Cohabitive. (Though I wrote Competitive, Cooperative, and Cohabitive, so I might be biased here.) I think it would be good to get “Cohabitive” into the general rationalist lexicon via some means though, and would vote in favour of post explaining the concept for the Best Of LessWrong collection. Overall Cohabitive Games so Far sprawls a bit in a couple of places, particularly where bullet points create an unordered list.
For the second part, I’d like to see a writeup of how Peacewager works in enough detail to play a couple games. That writeup exists, but this post has a link to a website that has a link to a .zip file with the rules. I get that Peacewager is a prototype and the rules are likely to change in the future, but if I’m going to review a post on the basis of the game itself, I’d like the rules to be in the post where it’s easier to comment on them. It’d be awkward if five years from now the Best Of posts had a dead link to an important part of the post. If I imagine I’m voting on the Peacewager rules themselves for the Best Of LessWrong. . . eh. I think I’d tentatively vote for their inclusion if the game succeeded at what it was trying to do, and against if I thought it was missing the mark. Right now the game is rough enough around the edges I think it doesn’t quite get there for me.
(Mako Yass does get the points for being the idiomatic man in the arena though- It’s been a year and I haven’t yet published either of my cohabitive games.)
Where does that land? I think Competitive, Cooperative, and Cohabitive is better for explaining the concept, but one of the two is worth putting in the Best Of LessWrong collection and if you like Cohabitive Games So Far then vote for it.
Overall Cohabitive Games so Far sprawls a bit in a couple of places, particularly where bullet points create an unordered list.
I don’t think that’s a good criticism, those sections are well labelled, the reader is able to skip them if they’re not going to be interested in the contents. In contrast, your article lacks that kind of structure, meandering for 11 paragraphs defining concepts that basically everyone already has installed before dropping the definition of cohabitive game in a paragraph that looks just like any of the others. I’d prefer if you’d opened with the definition, it doesn’t really require a preamble. But labelling the Background and Definition sections would also resolve this.
I think we should probably write another post in the future that’s better than either. I’m not really satisfied with my definition. It clearly didn’t totally work, given how many people posted games that are not cohabitive, but that could have just been unavoidable for various reasons, some quite tricky to resolve.
but this post has a link to a website that has a link to a .zip file with the rules.
In contrast, your article meandering for 11 paragraphs defining concepts that basically everyone already has installed before dropping the definition of cohabitive game in a paragraph that looks just like any of the others.
This is an excellent point and I’ve added a summary at the start, plus some headers. Thank you!
I want to take a moment and note that I’m currently approaching this cooperatively. (Yes, ironic given the subject.) I want the idea of cohabitive games to be in the LessWrong lexicon, I think you also want this, those are the articles we have the chance to put in a higher profile Best Of list, so anything that strengthens either is good.
I don’t think that’s a good criticism, those sections are well labelled, the reader is able to skip them if they’re not going to be interested in the contents
Plausible this is a stylistic thing and you should feel free to ignore me. I found that I lost track of the flow in the bullet points. For a specific example, the area that starts “Instead of P1′s omniscient contract enforcement system...” has a mix of long and short bullets that go like this-
Instead of P1′s omniscient contract enforcement system...
I’ve heard it suggested that if we got world leaders...
But I’ll make an attempt...
If you initially score for forests...
If you want your friends to be happy...
Taken to an extreme...
Give some players a binary...
- and when I get to “Give some players a binary...” I’ve sort of lost track of which level it’s on and what thought it’s continuing from, in part because “I’ve heard it suggested...” is long enough to take up most of the screen on my laptop.
The rules of OW.1 aren’t in a zip file
Now they aren’t :) This is a case where I think the review’s sort of caught the development process in amber. Release: Optimal Weave (P1) has the clean game links up front and easy to find; it’s the answer to my second part basically. I am still a little worried about those links going dead sometime down the line, though I also think it’s quite reasonable to want to keep a prototype where it’s easier to update for you and in a format that’s best for the standalone game.
Now they aren’t :) This is a case where I think the review’s sort of caught the development process in amber.
I’m not sure I understand what the topic is, but, flagging that you are encouraged to edit posts during the Review to make the better, more timeless versions of themselves.
I found that I lost track of the flow in the bullet points.
I’m aware that that’s quite normal, I do it sometimes too, I also doubt it’s an innate limit, and I think to some extent this is a playful attempt to make people more aware of it. It would be really cool if people could become better at remembering the context of what they’re reading. Context-collapse is like, the main problem in online dialog today.
I guess game designers never stop generating challenges that they think will be fun, even when writing. Sometimes a challenge is frustrating, and sometimes it’s fun, and after looking at a lot of ‘difficult’ video games I think it turns out surprisingly often whether it ends up being fun or frustrating is not totally in the designer’s control, it’s up to the player. Are they engaging deeply, or do they need a nap? Do they just want to be coddled all the way through?
(Looking back… to what extent was Portal and the renaissance it brought to puzzle games actually a raising of the principle “you must coddle the player all the way through, make every step in the difficulty shallow, while making them feel like they’re doing it all on their own”, to what extent do writers also do this (a large extent!), and how should we feel about that? I don’t think games have to secretly coddle people, I guess it’s just something that a good designer needs to be capable of, it’s a way of demonstrating mastery, but there are other approaches. EG: Demonstrating easy difficulty gradations in tutorials then letting the player choose their difficulty level from then on.)
(Yes, ironic given the subject.)
Trying to figure out what it would mean to approach something cooperatively and not cohabitively @_@
I feel like it would always be some kind of trick. The non-cohabitive cooperator invites us to never mind about building real accountability mechanisms, “we can just be good :)” they say. They invite us to act against our incentives, and whether they will act against theirs in return will remain to be seen.
Let’s say it will be cooperative because cooperation is also cohabitive in this situation haha.
I really like cohabitive games. I enjoy playing this one. I’m somewhat mixed on this post in particular being in the Best Of LessWrong collection. Cohabitive Games So Far looks like it’s doing two things; it’s outlining what a cohabitive game is and why it’s interesting, and it’s describing one specific cohabitive game but not in enough detail to play it.
For the first part (outlining what a cohabitive game is and why it’s interesting) I prefer Competitive, Cooperative, and Cohabitive. (Though I wrote Competitive, Cooperative, and Cohabitive, so I might be biased here.) I think it would be good to get “Cohabitive” into the general rationalist lexicon via some means though, and would vote in favour of post explaining the concept for the Best Of LessWrong collection. Overall Cohabitive Games so Far sprawls a bit in a couple of places, particularly where bullet points create an unordered list.
For the second part, I’d like to see a writeup of how Peacewager works in enough detail to play a couple games. That writeup exists, but this post has a link to a website that has a link to a .zip file with the rules. I get that Peacewager is a prototype and the rules are likely to change in the future, but if I’m going to review a post on the basis of the game itself, I’d like the rules to be in the post where it’s easier to comment on them. It’d be awkward if five years from now the Best Of posts had a dead link to an important part of the post. If I imagine I’m voting on the Peacewager rules themselves for the Best Of LessWrong. . . eh. I think I’d tentatively vote for their inclusion if the game succeeded at what it was trying to do, and against if I thought it was missing the mark. Right now the game is rough enough around the edges I think it doesn’t quite get there for me.
(Mako Yass does get the points for being the idiomatic man in the arena though- It’s been a year and I haven’t yet published either of my cohabitive games.)
Where does that land? I think Competitive, Cooperative, and Cohabitive is better for explaining the concept, but one of the two is worth putting in the Best Of LessWrong collection and if you like Cohabitive Games So Far then vote for it.
I don’t think that’s a good criticism, those sections are well labelled, the reader is able to skip them if they’re not going to be interested in the contents. In contrast, your article lacks that kind of structure, meandering for 11 paragraphs defining concepts that basically everyone already has installed before dropping the definition of cohabitive game in a paragraph that looks just like any of the others. I’d prefer if you’d opened with the definition, it doesn’t really require a preamble. But labelling the Background and Definition sections would also resolve this.
I think we should probably write another post in the future that’s better than either. I’m not really satisfied with my definition. It clearly didn’t totally work, given how many people posted games that are not cohabitive, but that could have just been unavoidable for various reasons, some quite tricky to resolve.
The rules of P1 (now OW.1) aren’t in a zip file, they’re just a web page: https://dreamshrine.org/OW.1/manual.html I guess I’ll add that to the article.
This is why I didn’t dwell on the rules in much depth. OW.1 was always intended as a fairly minimal (but also quite open-ended) example.
This is an excellent point and I’ve added a summary at the start, plus some headers. Thank you!
I want to take a moment and note that I’m currently approaching this cooperatively. (Yes, ironic given the subject.) I want the idea of cohabitive games to be in the LessWrong lexicon, I think you also want this, those are the articles we have the chance to put in a higher profile Best Of list, so anything that strengthens either is good.
Plausible this is a stylistic thing and you should feel free to ignore me. I found that I lost track of the flow in the bullet points. For a specific example, the area that starts “Instead of P1′s omniscient contract enforcement system...” has a mix of long and short bullets that go like this-
Instead of P1′s omniscient contract enforcement system...
Let us build a strand-type board game...
I’ve heard it suggested that if we got world leaders...
But I’ll make an attempt...
If you initially score for forests...
If you want your friends to be happy...
Taken to an extreme...
Give some players a binary...
- and when I get to “Give some players a binary...” I’ve sort of lost track of which level it’s on and what thought it’s continuing from, in part because “I’ve heard it suggested...” is long enough to take up most of the screen on my laptop.
Now they aren’t :) This is a case where I think the review’s sort of caught the development process in amber. Release: Optimal Weave (P1) has the clean game links up front and easy to find; it’s the answer to my second part basically. I am still a little worried about those links going dead sometime down the line, though I also think it’s quite reasonable to want to keep a prototype where it’s easier to update for you and in a format that’s best for the standalone game.
I’m not sure I understand what the topic is, but, flagging that you are encouraged to edit posts during the Review to make the better, more timeless versions of themselves.
A year ago: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/bF353RHmuzFQcsokF/cohabitive-games-so-far This post introduces the idea, motivation, and a bit of information about the game itself.
Four months ago: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/xY3A8xy6ox5jzmCAm/release-optimal-weave-p1-a-prototype-cohabitive-game A playable version is released, with rules.
(Apologies for link formatting, I’m on mobile at the moment.)
I think it’s fine to edit in “here’s a link to the thing I shipped later” at the top and/or bottom and/or middle of the post.
I’m aware that that’s quite normal, I do it sometimes too, I also doubt it’s an innate limit, and I think to some extent this is a playful attempt to make people more aware of it. It would be really cool if people could become better at remembering the context of what they’re reading. Context-collapse is like, the main problem in online dialog today.
I guess game designers never stop generating challenges that they think will be fun, even when writing. Sometimes a challenge is frustrating, and sometimes it’s fun, and after looking at a lot of ‘difficult’ video games I think it turns out surprisingly often whether it ends up being fun or frustrating is not totally in the designer’s control, it’s up to the player. Are they engaging deeply, or do they need a nap? Do they just want to be coddled all the way through?
(Looking back… to what extent was Portal and the renaissance it brought to puzzle games actually a raising of the principle “you must coddle the player all the way through, make every step in the difficulty shallow, while making them feel like they’re doing it all on their own”, to what extent do writers also do this (a large extent!), and how should we feel about that?
I don’t think games have to secretly coddle people, I guess it’s just something that a good designer needs to be capable of, it’s a way of demonstrating mastery, but there are other approaches. EG: Demonstrating easy difficulty gradations in tutorials then letting the player choose their difficulty level from then on.)
Trying to figure out what it would mean to approach something cooperatively and not cohabitively @_@
I feel like it would always be some kind of trick. The non-cohabitive cooperator invites us to never mind about building real accountability mechanisms, “we can just be good :)” they say. They invite us to act against our incentives, and whether they will act against theirs in return will remain to be seen.
Let’s say it will be cooperative because cooperation is also cohabitive in this situation haha.