As you can see, there’s a lot of stuff in this volume, largely because I was doing most of the writing. I was also getting better; some of these essays are topnotch ("How to Play God", "Representation Versus Depiction", "Interactivity, Plot, Free Will, etc"). But the others are pretty good, too. The only essays that I’ll steer you away from are the book review of two programming books, "The East Coast Developers Conference", and "Matha-Claus".
Program Size and the Art of Deratting
How To Play God
Reviews of two books on game programming
Culture of Instability
The East Coast Developers’ Conference
Evolutionary Game Design
How to Think: Sophomorism
Barrels o’ Fun
Representation Versus Depiction
Asymmetric Interactive Relationships
Networked Interpersonal Games
Interactivity, Plot, Free Will, Determinism, Quantum Mechanics, and Temporal Irreversibility
Lord Berkeley and Computer Games
Auteurs Versus Teams
Design by Cloning
Hollywood Envy
Matha-Claus is Coming to Town!
Play and Mentation
In Praise of Ambiguity
Societal Models of Programming
The Two Cultures War