Filling Bars: How Video Games Make Simple Progress Meaningful

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"It's a great way to fill bars" is a reference around my apartment about games that have a "grind" element.  For those don't immediately get the metaphor, it refers to games that have some kind of progress bar in it (often experience in an RPG) that one fills by various activities, and when it is filled, there is some advancement in a game.  You get the idea.

How many of our games are basically bar-filling?  We gain experience points to level a character, get enough science scores to give our fledgeling virtual civilization a technical advancement, or or just plain earn enouhg money to build that next railroad.  A lot of our games are filling bars, meters, or coffers, often from highly repetitive behavior.

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Mice, Technology, and Walt Disney: The Walt Disney Family Museum

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I visited the Walt Disney Family Museum in San Francisco with my wife and some friends, to celebrate my wife's birthday.  I was curious as it is – it's a museum containing a great deal of memorabilia about Walt Disney, and a chronology of his life, and run by his eldest daughter.  Disney's influence on our modern media can't be understated, so I figure a review was in order.

However, after going to the museum I'm going to have to split this review into two parts for you, my progeek audience.  One part will review the museum, the other will deal with some of the insights I had there.

To put it simply, it's a very geeky place – and Walt Disney was, when you think of it, a progeek.

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News Of the Day 10/12/2010

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And today . . . oh heck, look, it's Venture Capital all over the place. Here's the news!

Economics/Geekonomics
Richard Florida looks at how to save the suburbs. Walkability is a key, but take a moment to read the article and see what you think. Mr. Florida's never been hot on suburbs, so this is an intriguing read – and may be something to think about for your future.

Location:
The top 100 innovative cities for those of you thinking of relocating. Also you won't find much here to surprise you at all, but it's interesting.

Culture:
Futurist Nick Bilton says the future is storytelling. It's hard to sum up what he's saying so just read it – because it's worth it.

Anime and Manga:
Several companies team up to launch a new manga magazine called Monthly Comic Xenon. Details here, not really sure of the impact of this.

Comics:
Disney gets into digital comics. Which of course isn't surprising – but does suggest how crowded the market could get – Disney apparently wants all releases parallel in physical and e-published.

Technology:
OK, apparently everyone is throwing money around today. Pay-per-view video ad platform provider TubeMogul got $10 million in investment. Wireless, streaming gizmo company Veebeam, a DEMOgod winner, got $6 million in investment. Video tech provider BNI raises $16 million$21 million for it's new coronary imaging product – a neat mix of current and cutting-edge medicine. Care.com, who not only has a prime domain but also is a family service rating system got $20 million in funding. The first two are in California, the latter three in Massachusetts, both geekcentric areas.

Video:
A nice look at Apple TV that gives you an idea of how easy it is to use. Oh and of course it has Netflix. Take a read and get an idea of what they're up to.

Video Games:
Zynga sets up some offices in Seattle. OK Seattle-ites, you know what to do. It also suggests to me that Zynga wants a good footprint in the appropriate areas – which makes it easier to recruit and retain despite the costs of geek-heavy areas.

Looks like Zynga is going to need to keep working on its foundations. Japanese rival DeNA went on and bought ngmoco for $400 million. Biggest iPhone related acquisition to date. DeNA may be worth putting on your search list – they apparently have money to burn and a lot of drive.

And even more adventures in investment! CyberSports raises $6.8 million – they do freemium and sports which sounds like a perfect combo – and they do soccer. Playfirst gets $5.2 million and has a very powerful staff – a good combination.

QUESTION OF THE DAY: Where should Zynga set up office next?

– Steven Savage