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What Big Brother Teaches Us About Game Design 34

Posted by simoniker from the act-like-chicken-george dept.
Thanks to Skotos.net for their article discussing why the TV show Big Brother 4 is an example of good game design, and what we can learn from it. It's pointed out that "a group of n/2 (rounded down) + 1 people can dominate the game", if well-organized, but "the producers of Big Brother have made changes which dramatically reduce the power of a majority", including the ability to veto potential evictees. But it's argued the jury of previously evicted players voting on the final two contestants means "...if you backstab someone or betray them, even if it gets you further in the game, it could prevent you from winning." Is there a perfect strategy for winning Big Brother, and if not, is the concept of "unworthy winners" dissatisfying?
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What Big Brother Teaches Us About Game Design More

What Big Brother Teaches Us About Game Design

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  • maybe that's why it's a "reality" show (Score:3, Insightful)

    by dario_moreno ( 263767 ) on Tuesday September 30, 2003 @08:19AM (#7092777) Journal
    the author concludes that the best player never wins, but someone playing second place does if he does not backstab too much...this is exactly the same in real life ! We slashdotters know many underachievers from high school who ended up richer and happier than us ! Life is unfair, maybe because of that social element which makes people dislike and eventually disadvantage you if you are too good and/or too ruthless. The catch is then that one has to be a very good hypocrite in order to hide that.
    • Yeah sure, I mean Is not like the network is the one that gets and counts all the votes and theres no other system on earth to compare those votes with is not like they can easily modify and adulterate the results of their "polls" for whatever will be more shocking, controversial or at least unexpected, no matter if common sense yells at you: Are you crazy?!!! is completely impossible the people who watched this lame show voted that big breasted girl away!!! yeah I mean this is "Reality TV" that means its R
    • I am the underachiver from high school who ended up richer and happier then you, you insenstive clod!

  • Big Brother differences (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Oddly_Drac ( 625066 ) on Tuesday September 30, 2003 @08:19AM (#7092778)
    We've just started seeing Big Brother (US) in the UK for the first time, and the differences are startling.

    In the UK game (which is becoming increasingly 'gimmicked'), the housemates are nominated by the other housemates, and the three with the most votes go to a public vote. Generally it's about public perceptions from the outside, and the press (mostly tabloids) tend to pick someone to support. There have been some interesting accusations of 'vote stuffing' in the past.

    In the American version, it's closed voting and alliances are encouraged to provide voting blocks. This is a complete change to the UK version, and partially turned me off because of the constant bitching, but it's essentially a high-pressure political environment compared with the slightly more cooperative model of Big Brother UK.

    • Re:Big Brother differences (Score:4, Interesting)

      by bigbigbison ( 104532 ) * on Tuesday September 30, 2003 @09:30AM (#7093250) Homepage
      The first season of the US show was like the UK version. It was really very interesting. It was totally non-competitive and the people on the show really bonded. It was pretty interesting because the wife of one of the contestants arranged for the local phone company to pay for everyone in their home town to call and evict her husband's biggest rival, and of course the people in the house had no idea that was going on. People would rent planes with flying banners and stuff to try and tell the people in the house what was going on.
      It was really very interesting. So of course they totally changed it. They have made it more and more competitive every year. I guess it is working simce this years ratings are the highest yet.

      • because the wife of one of the contestants arranged for the local phone company to pay for everyone in their home town to call and evict her husband's biggest rival

        This isn't true. George's wife had nothing to do with that promotion. A local radio station arranged a big "call in" the first time George was up for nomination. CBS aired a segment that was edited to look like she had arranged everything and it convinced some of the already evicted houseguests that George was cheating. THEN BB broke the rules

        • I didn't know that. All I saw was what the show portrayed of the situation. I was so in love with Brittany at the time I was just crushed that she got kicked off. The fact that I can remember the name of a reality show contestant 3 years later kind of proves how addicted to that show I was. I tried the second season but the changes kept me away from it ever since.
    • The first US Big Brother had the same public voting system. However, it turned out that the public voted out the s**t-disturbers, making each week less and less interesting. In the end, it was just a huge love-in and everyone got along. So Big Brother had to step in and devise ways to turn the houseguests against each other.
    • It's important to point out that the first season played under the "British" rules was boring as hell and ratings were in the toilet. Since this new format was adopted it is much more of a success.
      • "It's important to point out that the first season played under the "British" rules was boring as hell and ratings were in the toilet. Since this new format was adopted it is much more of a success."

        Funnily, the ratings have stabilised a lot in the UK. I suspect that this might betray something about both nations psychosocial differences.

  • n/2+1 is always going to be a majority of the group which is n.

    Maybe I'm not seeing something, but isn't this already obvious to anyone that graduated the 3rd grade?


    Next they'll be telling us that game designers are learning that the more powerful the weapon you have, the better your chances of a frag.

    • Yes, that is the smallest group that is the majority. The point was that in many games of this style, the blocs that form of this size, can dominate the game easily by sheer numbers BUT the producers of Big Brother have lessened the power of the majority; thus the n/2 + 1 group is not guaranteed victory. Honestly, you got so wrapped up in understanding the very simple math that you didn't read the rest of the summary. Grow up.
    • Have you ever played Halo? The shotgun is arguably more powerful than the pistol. However, in all but the most confining maps, I'd put my money on the guy with the pistol. You know why? Because a pistol can zoom in and rain down bullets while you're too far away to do shit about it with the shotgun. This is subject too some constraints, ie you can't make one thing too strong or the other too weak, but other than that... Now applying it to Big Brother, it's not about having a majority, merely about fragmenti

  • Unworthy winners (Score:3, Funny)

    by BenEnglishAtHome ( 449670 ) on Tuesday September 30, 2003 @11:27AM (#7094334)
    I watched the first "Survivor" with great interest. Thought it was fascinating. Great concept. Lots of fun. Waited with great anticipation for the finale.

    And then that psycho Machievellian POS won.

    I haven't watched any of the cut-throat reality shows since. I think they're downright evil.

  • What Big Brother REALLY teach us is... (Score:3, Funny)

    by AzraelKans ( 697974 ) on Tuesday September 30, 2003 @12:08PM (#7094751) Homepage
    *Morons can go with their ordinary lives watching actors pretending to be morons going with their ordinary lives (paradox abound)

    *It is possible to create a show with the lowest production values and still make millions with it just by adding the motto: its entertaining because its real!

    *A lot of people can't recognize bad acting and writting when they see it. (bad acting sensing impaired?)

    *A significant part of the popullation in the US(and just about everywhere this show is a "hit") is in fact, lets be honest: not very smart.

    *The "Big Brother house kit" shall simply contain a set of small cameras easy to hid in your neighbors house. Of course your neighbor should be warned he will be taped, and giving a poor written script (contained in the package) so he can at least try to be entertaining. You also should be prepared when your neighbor gets his "Big Brother house kit." maybe its time to get some lingerie

    *You should prepare to be tortured by this show, its millions of clones and iterations which contain such important, thrilling and breath taking scenes such as "people having breakfast", "people using the bathroom", "people sleeping", "people sitting in their asses talking nonsense" and most specially "people you couldnt give a damn about storming about who should be out of your tv set (hint: all of them!)".

    Entertainment at its best!
  • Occasionally I'll play a FFA game in Warcraft III... it seems to work something like this. Basically, one player tends to get the biggest army, but loses most of it running over a few players. So when those nearly-dead players say "hey, stab this person in the back", it usually happens. That's why the best way to win at FFA is just to get a big army and sit there until the aforementioned powerful player dies.

    Likewise, if you get aggressive in Big Brother/Survivor/any other game, people will perceive you

  • Diplomacy (Score:3, Insightful)

    by neonstz ( 79215 ) * on Tuesday September 30, 2003 @04:04PM (#7097131) Homepage

    Isn't this what the board game Diplomacy [avalonhill.com] is all about?

    • Yes, they clearly originate from the same pool. What Big Brother (and Survivor) does is make the gameplay available to tens of millions of viewers.
  • Too bad porn isnt like this. Some of us would be ubbeeeeer elite game programmers O.o
  • I had seen Big Brother the title and I thought "What does network monitoring [bb4.com] have to do with game design?" /me goes back to work...

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