The Scavenger Game
By BONZO, HSM Editor
Xi’s sequel is coming soon, and for some time we have been making suggestions as to how Home itself could be turned into a game rather than just a platform for games.
Home is already a game for a lot of people — myself included. In a previous article, The Scavenger’s Run, I wrote about how for the reward collectors of Home, collecting virtual rewards is the game. It has been the incentive for me to play games I didn’t find that exciting or fun. The scavenger hunt games as a kid were the most exciting, and I have a feeling that the clue-hunting element of Xi is part of what made it so popular. So rather than bring in this reward-hunting element from time to time with a new game, why not make it a growing part of Home itself?
There are various ways of implementing a scavenger hunt feature to this platform. And there is a way for it to be implemented already with the community boards. For every game that is available, and every new game that comes in to the platform, and even the temporary promotional games – many of us hit the forums and fan sites — like the mother of them all, AlphaZone4.com. But every developer who creates a new game already has a set of pre-planned rewards it intends to release to the users; why aren’t these rewards listed on the community boards along with the corresponding game?
Blanked out reward images
Take the Casino as an example. The Casino overview gives you a list of all the games in the Casino, with the available rewards for each respective game. That would be a perfect platform for Home as a whole. Some of the rewards require to own certain items to achieve them. For example, rewards tied to the paid-for expansions in the Home Tycoon game, rewards for the new Emo Ray game, and Scribble Shooter.
Suppose you have a section of the community boards which showed every game available in Home which offered rewards. Then you have every reward that game offered as a blank outline similar to how the rewards in Egg Baron and even the Cauldron game were shown. For every reward you earned, that reward’s image was filled in on the community board, showing you your progress for each game you participate in. Now consider that display was public and you could see your progress, and your friends’ progress, as well as top progress. Make a competitive leaderboard type of progression on the community board. This would in turn make the most competitive people in Home try harder to participate in games to earn rewards and finish their progression before their friends.
Many games have a side quest of collectibles
What other incentive would you have besides cool rewards to collect from games? A full catalogue available to you showing you what rewards were available to collect from games, and a competitive platform between you and friends and the public? How about if each game listed on the community board had a meter gauge showing your progression, and once you reached 100% you earned a reward? Something simple, like a wall plaque with that game’s logo, or a trophy with that game’s logo. Even a t-shirt with that game’s logo would be a cool reward to own.
I know what some of you may be thinking: what about the temporary rewards? Yes, there are some games that offer seasonal rewards, or temporary items. The Casino, for example, gives away a limited reward for showing up on a specific day; the E3 event gave away Damien as part of the rewards when you completed certain tasks at E3 and then showed up at the Aurora Island. Temporary rewards wouldn’t be included, or conversely they could be their own tier of achievements. This tier could also include seasonal events, such as Halloween, winter holidays, and patriotic holidays.
Another concern some of you may have is, why would Sony want to drive traffic away from their blog forums by providing a list of rewards in Home?
They wouldn’t necessarily be doing that, though; they would provide a list of the number of available rewards, and a mystery silhouette of what it looks like, which fills in as you collect it — but until you collect it you wouldn’t really know what it is. It also wouldn’t tell you how to get it, which means you would still rely on the forums and fansites to find out exactly what do to to get it.
Here’s the benefit of this. It would show you there are a certain number of rewards, which is a big plus to know how many you need to get. It would provide a checklist of items you have already gotten by filling in the image as you get them, showing you what you have earned and what remains to be earned. For those that aren’t reward collectors, it would show you if there is anything worth trying to earn.
For example: even a silhouette would be clear if it is a wearable item, a companion, or a virtual decorative item. If there are only t-shirts to be earned, some who may have a wardrobe ready to explode with t-shirts may chose to not try to get those particular rewards. It would also serve to promote specific games in Home by showing they are worth playing and why they are worth it by showing you how many rewards you can get.
I thought, at one point…maybe it was just me being the compulsive, driven to collect all the rewards in Home — but I have learned since then there is a huge part of the community that is driven by that incentive. Take that incentive and make it a game itself. It may just drive more people to be reward collectors.
December 8th, 2012 by BONZO | 2 comments
BONZO is an editor and artist for HomeStation Magazine.
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This is a very interesting idea Bonzo and it has a lot of merit. I know a lot of reward hunters in Home and I think they would love this as it would turn their favorite hobby into a game itself. That would be a win for all concerned as these people also tend to be ones who spend a great deal of money in Home to obtain said rewards.
Great read as always.
Its certainly been the motivation for me when spending money