More Randomness, More Replayability For Games?

Thanks to GamerDad for its 'Long Shot' editorial discussing whether randomly generated gameplay and maps make for more interesting videogames. The author argues: "As time has advanced and games have become less like the arcade games of old, plotting and story have removed the randomness from many of our games... That's to say nothing of the gameworlds themselves... The places you'll visit are always going to be the same with each play through." However, he points out: "Ensemble Studios has done an absolutely superb job of making online play in Age of Mythology exciting through the use of random maps. These maps are generated using excellent seed criteria that give the player the feeling of playing a pre-designed map but with completely unique designs every time", concluding: "I'd like to see the same kind of thing applied to first person action and more."

Paranoia

[RidiculousPie]

This is about as close as I've gotten to what many old arcade games did as a matter of course, drop players into a world and let them fend for themselves in a situation with pre-determined rules but random everything else.

I personally prefer the paranoia solution. You aren't allowed to know the rules ;-). Endless crazy fun