CORDIAL MINUET ENSEMBLE

CriticalMammal

Member

Registered: 2015-05-06

Posts: 6

Admiring from a distance

In this post I'll try to outline why this game hasn't been able to keep me around as an active player. Looking through the forums it seems like the game hasn't attracted the audience size it was hoping for, so I hope this might be beneficial in some way if it's not already too late.

I started Cordial Minuet around May 6th 2015, and played it on and off for maybe a week or two before losing steam with the game. I've always had great admiration for how the game was designed ever since I heard about it (back when the visuals were still placeholder). It's devilishly clever and somehow manages to remain compact and simple-ish to pickup. The real money aspect was intriguing, and even though I'm not into betting I decided to play anyway because I found out you didn't actually NEED a lot of money to play. Pay the $2 + fees (I think?) and you can essentially play the game as long as you want if you keep the stakes low. So the barrier to entry is low enough for both learning the game and affording to play (enough for a college student on a budget haha).

I played and I remember thoroughly enjoying my time with the game, especially the first couple of days. It was thrilling and I won a fair amount of the games I participated in (almost exclusively games below $0.10). As I continued to play though, I think the stress of trying to win games got to me, and it grew less and less appealing popping open the game to be greeted with the simple yet ominous interface of the game. When I played games they seemed to drag on longer than I wanted to actually play, the board numbers started to blur together after a while and look the same. Learning my mysterious opponent grew tiring, I tried to keep track of their choices over multiple sessions but it was somewhat overwhelming deciphering their patterns. Even with the potential outcome bars on screen I grew tired of juggling info like "they've gone for rows that seem to have a high avg in the past but they've picked high risk rows some too...".

I think my personal preferences play a large role in why I can't seem to enjoy this game over time. I've found that I don't enjoy prolonged exposure to competitive multiplayer games as much as other more cooperative focused experiences. I can appreciate the tension and adrenaline during gameplay, but it wears on me over time. So a large part of my reasons for not sticking with the game might just be due to my personal preferences. I'm normally not attracted as much to these kind of things, but it's just so darn unique I couldn't help myself

I do wonder though, if the game's stunted growth is maybe in part because of its design. I understand the game is all about the unknown and playing with hidden information... but it seems like some of that might fundamentally undermine elements to building a community. I could very well be playing against bots and not know. I remember Jason saying somewhere he liked the idea of dehumanizing the opponent... but the side effect of that means that it's very difficult to build relationships through the game and appreciate that you ARE playing against a human and taking/giving them real money. The external resources exist, like the Twitter bot and chat room, but the barrier there is still pretty hard to overcome. I remember I played the Castle Doctrine in a similar fashion. I was completely enamored by it over the first week or two and just never came back to it afterwards. It also shared some similar design as Cordial Minuet in terms of playing with the idea of the unknown. I still love The Castle Doctrine conceptually as much as I like Cordial Minuet, but have no plans on revisiting the game.

Anyway, I came back to the Cordial Minuet today on a whim and did enjoy the penny match I played. It had a couple of games, and when I started to grow tired (and had taken the lead) I left with a $0.01 gain. I didn't know about the leave penalty increasing over time, so I suffered a 13 chip leave penalty. I still say that there should be a "continue playing" decision there, a lot of times I would be relieved after a winning round and don't think to quit until I see the next board appear haha.

I'm not sure if I plan on playing the game much anymore, but I might pop in here and there. If anyone has any additional questions they want to ask me feel free to make a post! I'd love to try and help this game (and Jason's future games) succeed, even though I myself seem to have lost most of my interest for the time being.

jasonrohrer

Administrator

Registered: 2014-11-20

Posts: 802

Re: Admiring from a distance

Yeah, you're right about all of this.

Separate from the anonymity, there are also fundamental things about the structure of the game that thwart community-building.  People pair up into matches and separate into very tense, me-vs-you games.  There's no sense of "sitting around the table" with a group of people.  That's part of what the regular tournaments were supposed to help with, but it still didn't really create a "poker table" feeling.  Note that 2-player poker isn't that popular.

The game itself is pretty dry, in part because there's no randomness.  Of course, there can't be randomness for legal reasons, but that means you'll never have the thrill of secretly being dealt AA in poker.  The "holy crap, this is it!" moment that keeps people coming back to Poker.  Granted, there's probably a strong dose of pure gambling juice in that cocktail, but so be it.  There's gambling in Isaac, Spelunky, FTL, etc., and that's part of their widespread appeal.  My next run in Spelunky could be THE run where I finally get the shotgun, climbing gloves, jetpack, and Wadjet Eye.  Or it could be a run where I get the dark level followed by the spider level.

Each game is a learning experience for me as a designer.  I wanted to make a game like this regardless of its commercial potential, simply because nothing like it existed.  However, it still makes a good case study about why some things take off and others do not.  How could a gambling game not take off?  Well, here's how.

But its also very easy to misjudge the cause of this or that negative symptom.  I've had a few people tell me that the anonymity is the problem in CM or TCD.  That if I just added chat, the games would have both become the next Rust or Minecraft.  But I think the problems run way deeper than that.  Adding chat (as an example) would muck with the aesthetic purity of the experiences while not really addressing the true obstacles standing in the way of larger, sustained audiences.

Both games are dangerous games that can really beat you down, and the only way to experience triumph is by beating someone else down.  For artistic reasons, I wanted extreme consequences to be in place (they could actually take your real money in CM, or actually take your hard-earned game-stuff in TCD).  This has a way of shrinking the initially-interested audience really quick.

I can compare these games to Hearthstone and Rust, which both are highly competitive, brutal games (no co-op mode).  Hearthstone softens it with no real consequences for loss (they can't win your cards from you, for example, just push you down in rank) AND the sheer randomness of the card draws (sometimes a bad deck/player can win).  Rust softens it with the possibility of getting lucky for a while and hiding out of harm's way (maybe they won't find my house way up on this mountaintop) AND cooperating with your friends (safety in numbers).

Anyway, for games like this that are unabashedly brutal, with no softener adde, some business models are better than others.  TCD made a lot of money, relatively speaking, while CM lost money.

Dan_Dan84

Member

Registered: 2015-02-14

Posts: 106

Re: Admiring from a distance

Oh hey, welcome back (sort of) Critical Mammal. I remember your long "first impressions" post from the early days of the launch contest. You seemed very enthusiastic about the game, but you hadn't appeared on the forums since then. In fact,  I think we've had quite a few people like you: people who joined the game, fell in love with it, played a lot for a little while... and then drifted away. Thanks for coming back and sharing your thoughts. I've been curious about the reasons people arrive, play a lot for a short period of time, but then never really join the community and play regularly (even over time).

I experienced some of the same symptoms as you during the days post-launch. While it was awesome having so many people playing, and therefore never waiting more than a few seconds for a game to start, the games did seem to blur into each other. Personally, I think I also experienced the Overjustification Effect, as I was playing so many games in order to win a prize outside of the usual reward for winning a game.

In any case, rather than rehash your and Jason's points, I think it would be more productive to say why I have stuck with the game. Aside from contest winnings, I have not won any money, nor have I lost much, either. I don't enjoy gambling, but when I have (CM, or Holdem at an expat pub), it's for the intrinsic joy of the game (and in the case of Holdem, the social aspect).

Jason is correct when he says that CM lacks the "gambling juice" that other games have, but I still find I get a shot of adrenaline playing CM that I don't get with anything else I play. And while I'll never be dealt AA in CM, watching that 36 light up is a very sweet feeling-- perhaps even sweeter than AA, since getting the 36 meant I had to position myself to receive it from another human being, not from a RNG (though my opponent is aware I might have the 36... can't get the jump on him like you can in poker).

The elegance and beauty of the game have also retained me, both the numerical elegance and the score graph, as well as the ink strokes on the board. Yes, the board is "ominous" and strange, and I'm sure the combination of demonic sketches, Italian words, and Hebrew letters has led to many "WTF" utterances, but it's also lovely the way it all works. To me, there's something addictive about that.

So to sum up: I'm likely a statistical anomaly who should also have tried the game, smiled and said "huh, clever," and then not come back. Unlike many dedicated members of the CM community, I'm also not a computer programmer, which puts me even further from the centre of the graph. And finally, as I'm neither a gambler willing to constantly lose and deposit cash, nor someone with friends and colleagues I can invite who are willing to constantly lose and deposit cash, I'm really not so good for business!

CriticalMammal

Member

Registered: 2015-05-06

Posts: 6

Re: Admiring from a distance

The game itself is pretty dry, in part because there's no randomness.  Of course, there can't be randomness for legal reasons, but that means you'll never have the thrill of secretly being dealt AA in poker.  The "holy crap, this is it!" moment that keeps people coming back to Poker.  Granted, there's probably a strong dose of pure gambling juice in that cocktail, but so be it.  There's gambling in Isaac, Spelunky, FTL, etc., and that's part of their widespread appeal.  My next run in Spelunky could be THE run where I finally get the shotgun, climbing gloves, jetpack, and Wadjet Eye.  Or it could be a run where I get the dark level followed by the spider level.

Being able to exploit things in an interesting way is really important, and CM allows for that. You mentioned that CM feels dry because there is no randomness, but I'd be compelled to argue that point a little. CM doesn't enforce randomness, but players can optionally use external random number generators/dice rollers if they wish to select columns. I think I enjoy CM less when I'm loosing focus, can't keep up with what my opponent is doing, and resort to random guesses because my strategy is weak.

CM actually, to me, seems like a stronger game the less random a players choices are. It's enjoyable figuring someone out, potential random elements in this game disrupt that ability. Betting in the game seems to me the least random part of the game in this regard, and also remains interesting throughout the length of the game, even if I'm loosing focus on board choices. Betting means something, most players aren't going to randomly select their bet amounts each phase, otherwise they'd bleed chips quick. So learning their betting habits perhaps might be more interesting to me at times than the board selection. Of course, they compliment each other. If I notice someone never backs down from a bet then I'll take advantage of that if I'm getting good numbers on the board (through "luck" or not).

Each game is a learning experience for me as a designer.  I wanted to make a game like this regardless of its commercial potential, simply because nothing like it existed.  However, it still makes a good case study about why some things take off and others do not.  How could a gambling game not take off?  Well, here's how.

I'm seriously super, super thankful to you for doing what you do. Even if some of these things haven't panned out as planned, they're absolutely fascinating experiments with game design. A lot of your stuff has helped illustrate (to me at least) areas of game design to explore that might have never even crossed my mind had I not played them.

But its also very easy to misjudge the cause of this or that negative symptom.  I've had a few people tell me that the anonymity is the problem in CM or TCD.  That if I just added chat, the games would have both become the next Rust or Minecraft.  But I think the problems run way deeper than that.  Adding chat (as an example) would muck with the aesthetic purity of the experiences while not really addressing the true obstacles standing in the way of larger, sustained audiences.

I very much agree with this... a whole lot. I don't necessarily think that the anonymous factor killed the potential for a community all by itself. I mean, heck, if that were true then no single player games would have one. Which is actually an interesting thought, because it gets you thinking about how people decide on what's worth forming around.

You seemed very enthusiastic about the game, but you hadn't appeared on the forums since then. In fact,  I think we've had quite a few people like you: people who joined the game, fell in love with it, played a lot for a little while... and then drifted away. Thanks for coming back and sharing your thoughts.

No problem! Interestingly enough I've been experiencing some of the same honeymoon feelings I had before while playing the game some recently. I know it might not last, but I do still enjoy the game a great deal when I throw myself back into the darkness.

I experienced some of the same symptoms as you during the days post-launch. While it was awesome having so many people playing, and therefore never waiting more than a few seconds for a game to start, the games did seem to blur into each other. Personally, I think I also experienced the Overjustification Effect, as I was playing so many games in order to win a prize outside of the usual reward for winning a game.

This is actually a really, really good point. I think I also burned myself out early on in a similar way. I'm not necessarily sure if it was because of the contest or not but I think playing the game in more moderation would have been beneficial to me enjoying the game more over time. The games in CM can sometimes be very, very lengthy individually too... I imagine it's been discussed at length on the forums before though.

Discordant Mind

Member

Registered: 2015-05-05

Posts: 14

Re: Admiring from a distance

I have had similar thoughts and experiences about CM. I started playing during the launch in May and was completely obsessed with the game for a week or two, playing for hours, constantly thinking about new strategies, and even dreaming about the game. I was lucky to win an amulet in the contest, and I quickly bagged over $10 in winnings off of my initial $2 deposit, and had delusions of grandeur for a while, hoping that CM could be a fun AND profitable hobby. I was learning and developing new strategies, getting a rush when I bluffed another player (or perfectly guessed their picks), and winning most of my matches. The game was a blast. But, after a few weeks and a few hundred matches, playing the game became less thrilling and more mechanical, and my interest started to wane. Partly, this was just fatigue from playing the game so much, but for me there was a bigger reason. The main reason I lost interest was because the player base rapidly dwindled, matches became hard to find, and the unskilled players vanished. Nowadays I'm only treading water, losing about as often as I win, because only the skilled players remain, and who wants to bet money when you have a 50% chance of winning, knowing that the house will take a cut? I guess a true gambler likes those odds, but I'm not a gambler. I only want to play when I know I'm likely to win. In short, I enjoy thrashing newbies, but there are no newbies left to thrash.

CM is a zero sum game, and it only makes sense to play if you know the odds are on your side. If you can find a match today, it's likely against a skilled opponent, so new players lose interest quickly, quit the game, and never return, leaving only the diehard, hardcore players behind to trade money back and forth. I think this is why most of the people who tried out the game have moved on, and why the game can't sustain a player base.