From the When 2.0 event, News. com has a video clip of Will Wright discussing games, time, and phase spaces.
The clip makes me want to see the beginning and end of the talk, but interesting nevertheless.
It’s is pretty clear that Will Wright thinks very much in terms of systems (high SQ), the surprising part is that he was able to pull off a very human-centered, emotional game like the Sims.
Yep! And why not? Consciousness, emotion, etc. are all forms of systemic emergence, after all.
It’s a bit of a cliche, but isn’t there a slight tendency that people who are very much into systems are not that much into emotions and vice versa?
(I say this as a programmer.)
The Sims isn’t really what I’d call a “very human-centered, emotional game”. Its actually a very mechanical, behaviorist take on human beings, which is somewhat satirical in its suburban commercialized context.
Socially oriented games (and non-games, don’t forget those) are largely virgin territory, and I do think it’ll take people with more of a balance between emotional intelligence and systems intelligence.