Skipping Rogues: The Roots of My Obsession With Randomization and Simulation

I love skipping stones. Its such a satisfying free form activity. All of it, from traveling to a location with enough water upon which to skip stones, to the finding of that perfect stone on the shore, to finally counting the number of skips, is pure magic to me. It has always been surprising how I can take so much satisfaction out of such a simple activity. But with each flick of the wrist, an entirely new and unique instance arises. In that small instance my hand, the stone, and the world around it are as one. And then the moment is over, the stone arriving at its final destination, clattering to the opposite shore or slipping from sight beneath the water.

It always starts with a search. My eyes scanning the shore as I begin sorting through various stones discarding those that are too large or small, too round or cubic. Near planar, flat stones were the most desirable. Their material and shape gave them various properties that one could exploit when skipping them across the water. Smooth round stones were the most accurate and traveled farther. Curved stones would skip in surprising patterns some returning like boomerangs. Each stone was a different set of possibilities. Each search of the shore yielding...

***

Wonderful randomized loot in the original Diablo was revelatory for the young impressionable me. The dungeon walls were ever shifting around my character, spawning new monsters and chests that dropped new loot. So much loot. With that final blow the Butcher exploded into gore and treasure raining down as if I had struck some macabre and decadent piñata. Who stores their money and trinkets in the bowels of a foul beast? The most notable loot were the coins, at first, shiny piles neatly separated from the blood and giblets. But that wasn't what I had come for, what I had killed for. There to the side of a potion was the steely glint of a blade, orange text above it marking it as legendary quality. My heart began to beat faster.

As much as I was intrigued by the new monsters and dungeon paths I stayed for the loot. Each new randomly enchanted item had the chance to affect gameplay in profound ways. Bolstering immunity to certain elements allowed my character to wade into the midst of enemies that would otherwise quickly overwhelm. Conversely, an enchantment that added elemental attacks would allow the exploitation of enemy weaknesses, allowing me to loot them faster. Some items would passively increase my movement or attack speed. But I never knew what the next meat piñata would drop, and that was nearly as compelling a reason to keep stabbing them open as the loot itself. Stabbing them open again and again until I reached down...

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To pick up that momentarily perfect rock, that is the culmination of the search. To stand up upon the strand with at least one if not several skipping stones in hand, ready for yet another search, yet another collaboration with chance. Its not enough to simply fling the stones at the water. This is skipping, and skipping is art. Where you throw is just as important as how. Bad footing can make an otherwise superb throw go kerplunk. Throwing against or with a current affects range and skip length. Still water has higher surface tension. The slope of the bank affects the angle of the throw.

Even after these considerations its always nice to pick a goal. Get across a specific stretch of water. Maybe try to hit a partially submerged log. Out throw whoever is with you. Whatever your goal, its bound by the conditions of the stone in hand, the bank beneath you feet, and the water before you. With that in mind, my eyes once more begin their perusal. Only now searching the bank or banks, the waters and all that is near at hand. I take a step forward and realize...

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Exploration is key at the start of a game of Civilization(any of them really). The first 10 turns have a profound effect on the next 100. What will my warriors and settlers find? I look for gold, silk, wheat, and ivory so I can establish a trading empire early on. Or will my tentative first steps uncover ancient ruins containing lost knowledge or treasure? Now is the time for planning. Who is nearby? What kind of resources are available? Is there a great spot to establish my second city? I look for rivers and jungles, as they will block my roads and hamper unit movement. And those barbarians over there? Well, they'll need to be handled soon.

While my play shaped the map, the map in turn shaped my play. Many times I'd find myself generating maps for the sake of seeing how they turned out. It was intriguing to see how a game that began on an island composed of three land squares would play out. Or what two adjacent civs who had discovered iron early on would do to each other and their neighbors(a storm of swords(men) being most likely). After sinking literally hundreds of hours into the Civilization franchise the hook that brings me back is this: there is always a new experience 1 map generation away. And with each new map I find that...

***

Choosing how to play is generally when things start getting good. A hollow log provides a tempting target. I cock back my wrist, stone held just so in my fingers, and let the it fly. A rookie mistake would be to use the best stone first. You always miss the first throw. Well almost always at least. Sometime the second throw too. Sigh...and the third. But eventually all the seemingly disparate pieces come together. The stone hums as it leaves your hands, striking the water with a rapid pattering sound. It barely touches the surface before rebounding again, dry on top, with barely a splash. It does this again and again leaving small, concentric, radial patterns on the water's surface. I watch head bobbing with each skip, mentally counting them comparing them to my previous tries. And the stones make it all the way to the target diving headlong into the hollow log to disappear with a splash.

A moment to savor this small victory and yet another search will begin. One goal met now on to another. I could stay here lobbing rocks at this unfortunate log, but that's not the point of skipping stones. The point is that the details and the moments make this outwardly repetitive activity constantly percolate into novel situations. By simply changing one of the many variables completely new and interesting things happen. From upstream a twisted mass of leaves and twigs comes floating by. Suddenly I have an intriguing new target. Sometimes the stars align and...

***

Spelunky hands you emergent play on a brimming silver platter. All the myriad systems come together so cohesively and convincingly that you rarely stop to even reflect on them. They are so logical within the context of play that you rarely question or deeply analyze whats happening. It's not so much in the details you expect, but rather those you don't. The darts that traps shoot are actual objects with defined physics. They catch fire, are effected by explosions and webs, can be stuck into wall to give you a momentary foothold, and have a deadly ricochet. I'm probably missing something in all that, but the point is that the myriad behaviors associated with a pointy stick in this game are breathtakingly complex. And that's just the darts. All the objects in the game have similarly complex contextual behavior. And its that complexity coupled with the randomized levels that make the game so compelling.

Spelunky is really a game that brought it all together for me. It is absolutely permeated randomization and simulation. Each and every playthrough is unique. Not only unique in that the levels and enemies and loot changes, but unique in the way you approach it. It allows you to be constantly exploring, constantly learning, find surprise after surprise. It left me almost shell-shocked at first. I couldn't believe that this game existed and that it hadn't existed before. It was almost like coming home. And the sentiment...

***

Is completely inexplicable. These games that I love tap into something so primal that it is nearly impossible to convey. But I love them. And that is enough for me.

The Little Engine That Could and Vegan Vampirism: A Court Ordered Rambling

I remember the cover most. The blue locomotive with a bright smiling face on the stack. The boy in overalls next to a girl in a dress and bonnet, the little dog running to get ahead of the train. And the toy clown with the pointy hat waving at them from the coal box, the car behind him filled with a menagerie of toy animals. The image, as was intended, was quite appealing to a child of four. It has stuck with me the many years since, and become emblematic in a way, as it is always the first thing to come to mind when I think of trains.

Even more appealing were the contents of this train. Talking toys, candy and fruit, the cabins were brimming with such wonderful stuff. Upon re-reading the story I found there was also spinach for some reason. I wonder why I forgot about that? Re-reading it also left a farcical impression of this train. Why are there no people on this train? Who is the conductor? Why do the good little boys and girls on the other side of the mountain need candy, fruit, and spinach so much? Are they vegans?

The meat of the story involves the three engines that happen upon the troubled train. The first, a fancy passenger engine, refuses to help out of arrogance. The second, a large freight engine, believes the job is beneath him. And the third, rusty and old, is too tired. All of these engines are trapped in their roles, trapped by their perceptions of themselves, and indeed trapped by the reader's perceptions. They are rigidly defined constructs, their existence focused under a narrow lens. All three exist for a single purpose, and anything outside that is beyond their comprehension. They don't even wonder about it, and neither should the reader.

The hero, or rather heroine, of the story is the fourth and final engine that shows up. Luckily for the toys and their haul of candy and spinach, this engine is used to switch trains in the yard. That's right, this is an engine that specializes in pulling other engines; a tow train. Fortunately this task doesn't fall too far outside the blue engine's realm of experience. She hasn't been over the mountain before, but she has pulled an engine or two in her day. So she agrees to help. Then comes the titular “I think I can,” up the hill refrain, ending in the “I thought I could” down the hill segment. End story. Presumably the good vegan boys and girls on the other side of the mountain get their talking toys, fruit, candy, and delicious spinach.

The odd part of the story is that the toys mention the need to deliver the train's fantastic cargo before the children on the other side of the mountain awaken. I guess this would imply that it was nighttime. The illustrations are quite bright and sunny though. I'm not really sure what's going on here. Is it a simple mistake? Are we peering into some dream world? Do the vegan children have an aversion to sunlight? Are they vampires? Vegan vampires? There doesn't seem to be enough information even to infer. The original 1930 publication of the story doesn't include any mention of a deadline. It just takes for granted that there are talking toys and trains in the world of the story. I kinda like that better. Logic be damned just tell me a good story. You're apt to get me talking about vegan vampire children and possessed toys if you don't allow me suspend my disbelief naturally.

So what's the takeaway for a 29-year-old me after reading this story again? For one thing, I think there should have been bacon in addition to everything else on that train. Also, as I try to apply logic to hypothetical situations the undead start popping up. That's a bit strange really. But most of all, I'm left thinking about roles in society, and how they are used to define an individual or even groups of individuals. How so very much is lost when you choose your definition or when one is chosen for you.

One thing that bothered me about the story is how rigidly defined the characters are. We know everything about them within a few sentences. I realize this is a children's book, but where are all the real people? Where are vibrant and delightfully flawed creatures that share existence with me? Those represented in the story are robotic by comparison. They don't have dreams or aspirations. They don't have real emotions. They can never know failure, so they can't know triumph. Even the little blue engine, our heroine, doesn't truthfully excel. She is just finishing a job that someone else started. She's working overtime, and her only payment is a sense of accomplishment. And though there isn't anything wrong with that, it hardly inspires greatness. At the end of the story she is still who she was at the beginning, her journey a distraction and anything but transforming. It is admirable that she helped the needy. But when she gets back to the yard there are still trains that need to be switched. And in the end that is who she is.

An industrial society values individuals that conform to the roles imposed by industry and it's organization. A machine does enjoy it's cogs, gears, and levers. But our society is post-industrial. We don't strive for conformity as individuals any longer. We value the unique, the innovative, and the progressive now. People are not expected to fill one role, they are expected to fill many. A bartender is also an assistant football coach and a musician. An artist is also a writer and a waitress. An actor is also a director and a producer. A teacher is also a veterinarian and a gardener. Information flows much more freely in this era. Entire libraries of knowledge are at our fingertips. I found both editions of, “The Little Engine That Could,” in less than five minutes on Google, while simultaneously reading about the election and looking at funny pictures of cats. You can't just be a little engine anymore. You have to be the little engine, the freight engine, and the toy clown.

Try it. Ask someone young what they do. They'll answer in several sentences. Press them further and they'll tell you even more. But you will never hear them say that they are one thing. You'll never hear one answer.