Once again, Mr. Miller has it backwards

by thebruce , Ontario, Canada, Monday, April 29, 2013, 06:42 (4233 days ago) @ Cody Miller

Hmm..

Hit a jump shot, gain points, and win the game by 1 point NOW
Hit a jump shot, gain an increase in your season stats towards an award farther down the line.

Miss a jump shot with 2 seconds left, your team loses, NOW
Miss a jump shot with 2 seconds left, you're disqualified from an award farther down the line.

Tension is subjective. Results are absolute. Which is better or worse? Depends who you talk to, what goal(s) they're aiming for, what sort of experience they value more when they play. Functionally, comparing positive and negative results, per examples illustrated above, are the same.

Cumulative results toward a consequence (good or bad) in which you can't lose by failing the condition, only get closer by being fulfilling it; and exclusive results that require only fulfillment in order to be complete, else you fail. (perhaps even a mix of both)

Seems like you were comparing cumulative success (there's no tension in missing a shot because you're not aiming for a goal which penalizes you for missing), with exclusive success (in which there's an element of "tension" NOW because if you lose, you FAIL).

You can have both types of results, rewards and penalties, being cumulative and exclusive. Drop your subjective opinion about which you think is better, and it comes down to how the developer decides to build win and fail scenarios, and what type of emotion they want to draw out of someone while playing.

If they want to attract a Cody, they need to not include cumulative rewards, and only include rewards and/or penalties that occur immediately.
If they want to attract the mainstream gaming crowd, as seems to be the trend these days, they'll include both types of rewards and maybe penalties, but definitely nothing bad that happens immediately (like, die and OMG start the level over?! Moar checkpointz!)

I see your logic, Cody, but you're riddling your arguments with capitals and your opinion as objective truth, and THAT PISSES PEOPLE OFF ;) (also sparks huge, ranting, and sometimes interesting, discussion threads :P)