@PandaCam wrote:
Some years ago I had a conversation about this with a computer game designer, who wanted game choices to have greater consequences, so that existential risks, or choosing to leave the farm and go on a quest, would force thoughtful consideration.
Since, pre-Farmville, it was hard to think about how staying on the farm could give player value, the only thing I could think of was that death would cause something really, truly bad to happen. Like the random deletion of great chunks of your hard drive. That, of course, would be vandalism and a virus, not a game. More feasibly, suppose the game costs $500 but you get the money back if you leave the game alive. Nothing came of that, but I still wonder every now and then how creating greater jeopardy from your RPG would alter the nature of the game.