Problems with the concept of 'Name in Game' purchases.

[LennyLeak]

I really liked the idea of making my own prisoner, so i bought the tier and had fun making a bio.

Recently however I have come to see this funding option as a problem for the game in some ways. One thing I noticed when I was reading through the already made bios was, that there was a whole lot of prisoners in jail for being 1337 haxxors. And nearly all prisoners were convicted of some quite spectacular crimes. So one problem is see is that our prisons are gonna be made up of hackers and crazy serial killers. It does not seem that there is gonna be much diversity in their rap sheets. I think this is a shame. Another problem is that these (mostly) crazy custom rap sheets (while funny) seems to somewhat eliminate the possibility of making use of prisoner rap sheets as a game mechanic. If prisoners are gonna have different sentences (which I really hope), then how are they supposed to match up with the rap sheets if these are custom? Another thing is, if we are gonna have different prisoner classifications (min sec, max sec etc.) then how are these gonna match up with custom rap sheets? It seems like a ton of work if you have to match that up individually for each prisoner.

While I think the idea of cutoms bios is funny, and I'm sure it has brought more money to the company, I cant help but think that it will stand out in a negative way when the game gets more complete, and that it will compromise how believable the game feels.

I would much prefer that there was made a list of crimes (theft, robbery, assault, murder, vandalism etc.) with a corresponding variable jailtime that was somewhat realistic. The crimes could then be classified such that they would determine the security rating of the prisoner. What would be especially cool is that this could be used to make proper rap sheets with past crimes. As an example lets say that we had: theft = security rating 1, robbery = security rating 3, assault = security rating 5, murder = security rating 10. An algorithm would give each prisoner a rap sheet and a corresponding security rating to determine if the prisoner was low or hight threat etc. So prisoner X would have a rap sheet of: Theft, Theft, robbery, giving him a security rating of 5 perhaps landing him in low sec. While Prisoner Y would have a rep sheet of: Assault, theft, assault, robbery, murder. Giving him a security rating of 24 landing him in high sec. That would make a believable set of prisoners and give the prisoners some diverse and potentially funny stories. It would be even more cool if this was extended to an overview of the actions during incarceration, such that when the inmate was involved in a fight in your prison, additional time would be added to his sentence and it would be noted in his rap sheet. That way prisoners would feel very unique even though they were created in a generic way.

I realize that it's a bit late to change eveything around, but I'm really curious about how the devs are planning to handle the rap sheets as a game mechanic combined with the reality of custom bios. I think a good compromize could be if the name in game option was changed to write a bio of the character, but not being able to make the "rap sheet" as such. So you could not decide the nature of the commited crimes, but you could still personalize the character with characteristics and background.

[christopher1006]

I doubt they'd change the product on those who bought it but they might do a bit of censoring. Lets use your 1337 haxxor example, if it can't be made sense of then the person who submitted it shall be asked to resubmit a better and more realistic rap sheet. If it's a rather spectacular crime that prisone might becom rare based on what he did. I personally don't want a prison full of Rambo, Chuck Norris, and the hulk. Also could you link where you viewed the already posted bios?

[LennyLeak]

I doubt they'd change the product on those who bought it but they might do a bit of censoring. Lets use your 1337 haxxor example, if it can't be made sense of then the person who submitted it shall be asked to resubmit a better and more realistic rap sheet. If it's a rather spectacular crime that prisone might becom rare based on what he did. I personally don't want a prison full of Rambo, Chuck Norris, and the hulk. Also could you link where you viewed the already posted bios?

The link is in the "name in game" thread, but I do not think that it works anymore.

Yeah they wont be able to change it all around. I would like for it to change to bio instead of rapsheet, but at least there would be the option of changing the input method. All that is promised so far is that you will be able to "supply the info for his rapsheet". They could change it to a list of crimes, so that you would be able to check off the crimes that your character had committed. That way they would not even have to review each rapsheet for obscenity. On top of that they could introduce the ability to make a bio to make good on the change. I really like the fun potential, and I think that some of the existing rapsheets are very humorous. I just think that the whole thing is problematic. If people made a bio instead they could still write fun stuff, even about crimes, but it would not have a impact on gamemechanics.

I would really love to hear from Chris if they've thought about how to handle the rapsheets.

[Azarath]

I know personally, I just wrote a silly one in the time waiting to hear about how the higher tier purchases will be handled. Probably others as well that haven't decided on their main crimes yet, so added some in the meanwhile.

[LennyLeak]

I know personally, I just wrote a silly one in the time waiting to hear about how the higher tier purchases will be handled. Probably others as well that haven't decided on their main crimes yet, so added some in the meanwhile.

Yeah you may be right. But I think that most people will have a tendency to make sensational characters. When they put themselves in the game they are not gonna settle with being an ordinary Joe Schmoe. Look at RPGs. Nearly noone plays some random dude. Everyone want's to be special. But even if people made more believable rapsheets I still think it is problematic with sentencing and such. I would really like to know how the devs are planning to handle it.

[Azarath]

I think my one is still there where he's sentenced for killing the stations pet parrot after being arrested for a DUI? But yeah, I see your point, though I think that tier was one of the limited availability ones, so, hopefully a lot more mundane staffmade ones will be added as well

[LennyLeak]

I think my one is still there where he's sentenced for killing the stations pet parrot after being arrested for a DUI? But yeah, I see your point, though I think that tier was one of the limited availability ones, so, hopefully a lot more mundane staffmade ones will be added as well

Hehe, might be. It's been a while since I checked the list. I ilke the fun stuff, I'm just worried how it will work with other aspects. I do not think it's limited. They've sold almost 1500 of them, and I saw them say somewhere, that they would have no problem with all prisoners being created this way.

[Azarath]

Yeah, just checked myself you're right, it's the face in game and up that's limited.

Cool note: Number of Introversioner packs sold: 1337
And grr, I didn't try to buy the Warden one when it was at 5 sold, since it said all sold, and then a 6th sold. Grr.

[xander]

1337

That is the time at which my daughter was born!

Also, I don't understand what the big deal is about the rapsheets. It's a game, guys. Live a little.

xander

[Azarath]

Your daughter is officially a cool kid

[LennyLeak]

Also, I don't understand what the big deal is about the rapsheets. It's a game, guys. Live a little.

xander

Well, read my OP. I'm not sure what constitutes a 'big' deal, but I do think there is something there. It's not like it's a fundamental critique of the game. And I do know it's a game - a very cool one at that. I want it to be as good as possible, just like you I guess. I do live a little, I'm not sure what you mean. Do you think I went totally overboard in my OP? It's not like I'm using CAPS or insults or saying that the game sucks, I'm just curious. I would think that curiousity is part of living. So, get excited and curious - and live a little xander

[FISKER_Q]

Sounds like a good idea actually.

They could probably with some ease + community effort take the existing system and make it into two seperate values in-game.

Name + Nickname
Nature of the crime + Category

They would no longer be connected, and it could encourage people to come up with different stories since they realize that even though the story is not connected to their specific name they might still get one of the crimes that other people have contributed.

[Mas Tnega]

I wouldn't change either in that circumstance. And I'm one of the "1337 haxxor" entries. Damnit, I *like* my entry. I don't like that the formatting's disappeared, but damnit I like my entry.

Call backs to Uplink were inevitable. It's just the users' doing this time around.

[LennyLeak]

I wouldn't change either in that circumstance. And I'm one of the "1337 haxxor" entries. Damnit, I *like* my entry. I don't like that the formatting's disappeared, but damnit I like my entry.

Call backs to Uplink were inevitable. It's just the users' doing this time around.

Just to be clear, I do not think that the hacker entires are lame. When I think about it the whole formulation "1337 haxxor" might have implied that. It's all good, and only natural for nerdy alpha-playing computer types like us I think. I would also rather be a hacker than a violent criminal . I am more concerned about the variery of crimes this way. I think it kinda defeats the purpose of a rapsheet if 80% of the inmates are there for hacking, and I would really like a "real" rapsheet that listed prior offences. A list of prior convictions would create a story all by itself with just a few bullet points. I dont know if you guys have played Crusader Kings 2, but one thing I think is awesome about the game is that a system of character traits (friendly, greedy, angry, insande etc.) repesented with icons can sorta create a whole story without anything being written.

[Matic3d]

Most of the problems mentioned could be dealt with simply by including user-based prisoners as part of a ratio to "standard" prisoners... even if the list is full of 1337 haxxors, if only 1 in 10 is from this list the numbers aren't bad.