Essays
These are full-blown essays, papers, and articles.
Presentations
Slideshows and presentation materials from conferences.
Interviews and Panels
Reprints of non-game-specific interviews, and transcripts of panels and roundtables.
Snippets
Excerpts from blog, newsgroup, and forum posts.
Laws
The "Laws of Online World Design" in various forms.
Timeline
A timeline of developments in online worlds.
A Theory of Fun for Game Design
My book on why games matter and what fun is.
Insubstantial Pageants
A book I started and never finished outlining the basics of online world design.
Links
Links to resources on online world design.
All contents of this site are
© Copyright 1998-2010
Raphael Koster.
All rights reserved.
The views expressed here are my own, and not necessarily endorsed by any former or current employer.
Level after level, he ascended the food chain. He defeated the Mako Bikers in the Turbine Tunnels. He outsmarted the Orca Warlocks in the Coral Catacombs. Each victory made him less Leo and more Sharkboy. His movements became fluid, predatory. His human memories—his mom’s lasagna, his failed math test, his first kiss—faded like old photographs left in the rain.
A cutscene played. Finley, his little brother (a blue reef shark in a hoodie), was freed. Finley hugged him. “I knew you’d come, Sharkboy.” sharkboy game
The fight lasted ten minutes. It was a ballet of teeth and terror. Leo lost an eye. He felt it go dark, the socket a throbbing crater. He lost a fin. He was bleeding, broken, on the edge of death. Level after level, he ascended the food chain
Behind him, through the apartment window, he saw the city. But it wasn’t his city anymore. The skyscrapers were coral. The cars were schools of fish. The people? They were all sharks. Tiger sharks in business suits. Bull sharks as cops. And they were all looking up at the one building that still looked human: his. Each victory made him less Leo and more Sharkboy
The world dissolved into a loading screen: pixelated waves, a chunky 8-bit shark fin, and the tagline: “Eat. Evolve. Rule the Deep.”
