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Fundamental Flaws in Game Design
Fundamental Flaws in Game Design
| Name: | Eric Robinson | |
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| Date Posted: | Jul 03, 2007 | |
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Note: As was the case with my previous .plan, this was originally posted on my personal family/friend blog. I reprint it here in the hopes that others may find it useful or a catalyst for interesting debate. /Note
---------------- [Originally posted May 22nd, 2007] ----------------
The title of this entry may seem a bit misleading without explication. By "Fundamental Flaws" I do not purport to expound multiple flaws through the body of the text. What I intend by that title is deeper in both meaning and implication. Like any type of design, Game Design is subject to flaws that can kill an otherwise perfect idea. In this entry I will outline one such flaw, using the term fundamental as a classification.
A fundamental flaw in game design is any design that interferes with the player's learning. Games, at their core, require constant learning in order to elicit the elusive sense of "fun". When the learning process is hampered, games become either frustrating or boring. Note that this learning is not learning in the classical sense but learning as can be defined by "the process of coming to understand a system." That said, let's move to the meat of the argument.
I recently came into possession of the sequel to one of the best received games of all time, Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island (also available on the Gameboy Advance). The sequel, Yoshi's Island DS, is a Nintendo DS game that combines the gameplay mechanics of its predecessor with the handheld's unique interface. The designers then added a few extra mechanics of their own, most likely in an effort to differentiate it from its legacy. One of these new mechanics, however, proves immensely detrimental to the rest of the design. In theory this mechanic has plenty of merit. In implementation, however, the mechanic erodes gameplay. The mechanic I speak of is the character change "Bus Stop".
In order to understand the argument a brief explanation of the games' mechanics is prudent. First, a brief explanation of the gameplay found in the original Yoshi's Island. The main mechanic in this game involves perfectly elastic collisions. Baby Mario rides atop Yoshi who has the ability to eat things which then turn into eggs. Yoshi throws these eggs at various objects in the game including targets, enemies, and walls. The eggs experience up to three perfectly elastic collisions against walls allowing you to attack around corners by properly angling a shot. This egg-throwing mechanic accounts for 95% of the gameplay. The other five percent is made up of standard platforming mechanics (running, jumping, etc.) and a few instances of gimmick gameplay (similar to mini-games, these segments involve turning Yoshi into a helicopter or mole for certain specially designed courses).
Yoshi's Island DS retains all of the above gameplay but incorporates level designs that take advantage of the second screen provided by the Nintendo DS. The new game then builds upon those designs by adding multiple characters for Yoshi to carry around. Each character represents a unique set of abilities that you can use to explore the levels in the game. Mario provides faster movement, eggs that bounce off of walls, special boxes become tangible, and, if Yoshi comes in contact with a star, an invincible Mario can run around in his diapers, obliterating anything in his path. Princess Toadstool carries an umbrella allowing Yoshi to float and ride strong winds into soaring heights. Donkey Kong swings on ropes, scales vines, throws eggs so hard they blow up on impact, and destroys porous walls by bashing through them. King Koopa breathes fire, allowing Yoshi to light torches and melt ice. Finally, Wario carries a magnet that can attract coins and metal platforms and allows Yoshi's eggs to bounce off walls like Mario's. Each of these characters represents a set of tools and/or abilities that the player can use to explore the levels found within the game.
Any novice level designer can see a myriad of interesting layouts that mix obstacles specific to each of the characters above. Vines rise to the treetops which in turn lead to a windy, bottomless pit with plenty of coins littered throughout the sky. But gameplay like this is not possible in Yoshi's Island DS because of the character switching mechanism; the fundamental flaw in the game's design.
In order to change characters, Yoshi must touch a little signpost marked "Bus Stop". When touched, the sign summons a stork. Jumping and touching the stork will exchange the current character for another. The player must continue to touch the stork until they get the character they desire.
This mechanic implies two things: first that players must seek out "Bus Stops" and, second, that level designers are limited to simplistic designs. If a player sees a vine, they know that Donkey Kong is required. If Donkey Kong isn't riding Yoshi they must run to a "Bus Stop", which might not be available for a while. And what if the level designer threw in a metal platform just out of reach? The player would have to run back and forth between those sections of the level and a "Bus Stop". This is how the game works and scenarios like this are the norm.
"The player gets bored and frustrated because of all the running back and forth. Right?" Not exactly. Plenty of games have players backtracking without the same frustration. The player gets bored/frustrated because this design mechanism runs counter to the learning process.
Each character in Yoshi's Island DS represents a unique set of tools with which the player can explore the two dimensional landscape presented in the game. These tools are introduced sequentially, allowing players ample time to explore the possibilities opened by their newfound abilities. As the player advances through the levels their understanding of and skill with the tools increases. Players should start to see the levels in terms of the tools at their disposal. A player would say "There's a vine. I'll use Donkey Kong to climb it." The design, however, disallows such exploration.
The "Bus Stop" is, in a manner of speaking, the player's tool belt. Throughout the game, the player acquires new tools and adds them to the tool belt. Real tool belts, however, are worn on the user, keeping those tools handy for the user. The design in Yoshi's Island DS however, keeps the tool belt away from the player, sometimes even going as far as hiding it from them. No carpenter in their right mind would leave their tool belt in the truck when working on a job site and no game designer should force a player to search for one.
Consider learning in the traditional sense (as it retains its analogues). A student studying math will learn Algebra, Geometry, Trigonometry, Calculus, etc. Ideally the student will remember enough of each to solve generic/basic problems without having to go back to school. Imagine the attrition rate in High School math classes if each and every problem required the student to refer to the books.
Luckily for most students, this is not the case. Memory allows us to store formulas and equations that we can pull out and utilize at the drop of a hat. An Algebra teacher will administer tests in which students are asked to make use of the quadratic formula. The test is a system and the tool to explore that system is the quadratic formula. An interesting test would ask the students to utilize the quadratic formula in conjunction with formulas or concepts that they had studied previously.
A player of Yoshi's Island DS will happen across a vine while using Princess Toadstool. They will immediately recognize it as a Donkey Kong-accessible area and see a route; they know exactly what to do and how to do it. The game design, however, disallows them the freedom to experiment. Instead, they are forced to put their experiment on hold as they seek out the "Bus Stop".
This flaw in game design is truly fundamental as it interrupts the learning process inherent to any game. In summation, only allowing players access to a subset of their tools is bad game design.
One must be careful to not misinterpret and/or misapply this statement. One could try to argue that Resident Evil's design features this flaw but somehow manages to skirt the frustration/boredom caused by the flaw. In Resident Evil, a survival horror game, a player could get to a door of which you have the key but it's not in their backpack: it's in the linked chests littered throughout the game in various rooms. The player could go back the way they came or start opening doors they avoided to find out if one of them has one of the chests. In this case the chests are like the "Bus Stop" signs in Yoshi's Island DS and the key represents a tool that the player cannot use.
The difference here is choice. The player in the case outlined above did not have the key on them but that's not to say that all other player's happening upon the same door would be similarly unequipped. The player has a limited inventory, certainly, but what they keep in it is their choice. That is part of what makes the game what it is and helps define the Survival Horror genre. Reduced inventory size decreases the amount of tools you can carry and conversely and proportionally increases the difficulty/risk. To put it simply, the above situation refers to inventory management, a design mechanism in which the designer allows the player to choose a restricted number of tools to have at the ready.
Yoshi's Island DS sports a lot of great ideas and many interesting designs. Unfortunately the game is mired by the designers decision to incorporate the "Bus Stop" character switching mechanism. I posit that Yoshi's Island DS would have been many times more enjoyable if you could switch between players like weapons in a First Person Shooter game. Incorporating such a design decision would have the added bonus of granting the level designers exponentially more options when creating landscapes for players to traverse.
Unfortunately, Yoshi's Island DS is not the first game to feature this fundamental flaw. Take Donkey Kong 64 for instance. In their review, IGN writes
For the record while I finished Yoshi's Island DS, I never got further than a few hours into Donkey Kong 64 (reason: too tedious and frustrating).
While fundamental flaws like the one outlined here will not necessarily ruin a game's playability, I posit that they severely hamper the player's enjoyment of them. These flaws should be identified and avoided at all costs. I hope that the designers at Nintendo and its second party affiliates can recognize this problem and start producing more masterpieces like the original Yoshi's Island.
---------------- [Originally posted May 22nd, 2007] ----------------
The title of this entry may seem a bit misleading without explication. By "Fundamental Flaws" I do not purport to expound multiple flaws through the body of the text. What I intend by that title is deeper in both meaning and implication. Like any type of design, Game Design is subject to flaws that can kill an otherwise perfect idea. In this entry I will outline one such flaw, using the term fundamental as a classification.
A fundamental flaw in game design is any design that interferes with the player's learning. Games, at their core, require constant learning in order to elicit the elusive sense of "fun". When the learning process is hampered, games become either frustrating or boring. Note that this learning is not learning in the classical sense but learning as can be defined by "the process of coming to understand a system." That said, let's move to the meat of the argument.
I recently came into possession of the sequel to one of the best received games of all time, Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island (also available on the Gameboy Advance). The sequel, Yoshi's Island DS, is a Nintendo DS game that combines the gameplay mechanics of its predecessor with the handheld's unique interface. The designers then added a few extra mechanics of their own, most likely in an effort to differentiate it from its legacy. One of these new mechanics, however, proves immensely detrimental to the rest of the design. In theory this mechanic has plenty of merit. In implementation, however, the mechanic erodes gameplay. The mechanic I speak of is the character change "Bus Stop".
In order to understand the argument a brief explanation of the games' mechanics is prudent. First, a brief explanation of the gameplay found in the original Yoshi's Island. The main mechanic in this game involves perfectly elastic collisions. Baby Mario rides atop Yoshi who has the ability to eat things which then turn into eggs. Yoshi throws these eggs at various objects in the game including targets, enemies, and walls. The eggs experience up to three perfectly elastic collisions against walls allowing you to attack around corners by properly angling a shot. This egg-throwing mechanic accounts for 95% of the gameplay. The other five percent is made up of standard platforming mechanics (running, jumping, etc.) and a few instances of gimmick gameplay (similar to mini-games, these segments involve turning Yoshi into a helicopter or mole for certain specially designed courses).
Yoshi's Island DS retains all of the above gameplay but incorporates level designs that take advantage of the second screen provided by the Nintendo DS. The new game then builds upon those designs by adding multiple characters for Yoshi to carry around. Each character represents a unique set of abilities that you can use to explore the levels in the game. Mario provides faster movement, eggs that bounce off of walls, special boxes become tangible, and, if Yoshi comes in contact with a star, an invincible Mario can run around in his diapers, obliterating anything in his path. Princess Toadstool carries an umbrella allowing Yoshi to float and ride strong winds into soaring heights. Donkey Kong swings on ropes, scales vines, throws eggs so hard they blow up on impact, and destroys porous walls by bashing through them. King Koopa breathes fire, allowing Yoshi to light torches and melt ice. Finally, Wario carries a magnet that can attract coins and metal platforms and allows Yoshi's eggs to bounce off walls like Mario's. Each of these characters represents a set of tools and/or abilities that the player can use to explore the levels found within the game.
Any novice level designer can see a myriad of interesting layouts that mix obstacles specific to each of the characters above. Vines rise to the treetops which in turn lead to a windy, bottomless pit with plenty of coins littered throughout the sky. But gameplay like this is not possible in Yoshi's Island DS because of the character switching mechanism; the fundamental flaw in the game's design.
In order to change characters, Yoshi must touch a little signpost marked "Bus Stop". When touched, the sign summons a stork. Jumping and touching the stork will exchange the current character for another. The player must continue to touch the stork until they get the character they desire.
This mechanic implies two things: first that players must seek out "Bus Stops" and, second, that level designers are limited to simplistic designs. If a player sees a vine, they know that Donkey Kong is required. If Donkey Kong isn't riding Yoshi they must run to a "Bus Stop", which might not be available for a while. And what if the level designer threw in a metal platform just out of reach? The player would have to run back and forth between those sections of the level and a "Bus Stop". This is how the game works and scenarios like this are the norm.
"The player gets bored and frustrated because of all the running back and forth. Right?" Not exactly. Plenty of games have players backtracking without the same frustration. The player gets bored/frustrated because this design mechanism runs counter to the learning process.
Each character in Yoshi's Island DS represents a unique set of tools with which the player can explore the two dimensional landscape presented in the game. These tools are introduced sequentially, allowing players ample time to explore the possibilities opened by their newfound abilities. As the player advances through the levels their understanding of and skill with the tools increases. Players should start to see the levels in terms of the tools at their disposal. A player would say "There's a vine. I'll use Donkey Kong to climb it." The design, however, disallows such exploration.
The "Bus Stop" is, in a manner of speaking, the player's tool belt. Throughout the game, the player acquires new tools and adds them to the tool belt. Real tool belts, however, are worn on the user, keeping those tools handy for the user. The design in Yoshi's Island DS however, keeps the tool belt away from the player, sometimes even going as far as hiding it from them. No carpenter in their right mind would leave their tool belt in the truck when working on a job site and no game designer should force a player to search for one.
Consider learning in the traditional sense (as it retains its analogues). A student studying math will learn Algebra, Geometry, Trigonometry, Calculus, etc. Ideally the student will remember enough of each to solve generic/basic problems without having to go back to school. Imagine the attrition rate in High School math classes if each and every problem required the student to refer to the books.
Luckily for most students, this is not the case. Memory allows us to store formulas and equations that we can pull out and utilize at the drop of a hat. An Algebra teacher will administer tests in which students are asked to make use of the quadratic formula. The test is a system and the tool to explore that system is the quadratic formula. An interesting test would ask the students to utilize the quadratic formula in conjunction with formulas or concepts that they had studied previously.
A player of Yoshi's Island DS will happen across a vine while using Princess Toadstool. They will immediately recognize it as a Donkey Kong-accessible area and see a route; they know exactly what to do and how to do it. The game design, however, disallows them the freedom to experiment. Instead, they are forced to put their experiment on hold as they seek out the "Bus Stop".
This flaw in game design is truly fundamental as it interrupts the learning process inherent to any game. In summation, only allowing players access to a subset of their tools is bad game design.
One must be careful to not misinterpret and/or misapply this statement. One could try to argue that Resident Evil's design features this flaw but somehow manages to skirt the frustration/boredom caused by the flaw. In Resident Evil, a survival horror game, a player could get to a door of which you have the key but it's not in their backpack: it's in the linked chests littered throughout the game in various rooms. The player could go back the way they came or start opening doors they avoided to find out if one of them has one of the chests. In this case the chests are like the "Bus Stop" signs in Yoshi's Island DS and the key represents a tool that the player cannot use.
The difference here is choice. The player in the case outlined above did not have the key on them but that's not to say that all other player's happening upon the same door would be similarly unequipped. The player has a limited inventory, certainly, but what they keep in it is their choice. That is part of what makes the game what it is and helps define the Survival Horror genre. Reduced inventory size decreases the amount of tools you can carry and conversely and proportionally increases the difficulty/risk. To put it simply, the above situation refers to inventory management, a design mechanism in which the designer allows the player to choose a restricted number of tools to have at the ready.
Yoshi's Island DS sports a lot of great ideas and many interesting designs. Unfortunately the game is mired by the designers decision to incorporate the "Bus Stop" character switching mechanism. I posit that Yoshi's Island DS would have been many times more enjoyable if you could switch between players like weapons in a First Person Shooter game. Incorporating such a design decision would have the added bonus of granting the level designers exponentially more options when creating landscapes for players to traverse.
Unfortunately, Yoshi's Island DS is not the first game to feature this fundamental flaw. Take Donkey Kong 64 for instance. In their review, IGN writes
Quote:Sound familiar? Instead of "Bus Stops", Donkey Kong 64 features "Tag Barrels": barrels that will change the character you use when you touch them. The situation in Donkey Kong 64 is further complicated by the fact the player must unlock many of the moves outlined above by purchasing them with various tokens found littered throughout the game's levels. Combine this with the fundamental flaw outlined above and you can understand if a player considers this a frustrating game.
Each character starts out with a basic set of moves that can be performed. As the adventure progresses, the apes gain new moves, weaponry, musical abilities and more. So, in the end, we've got five different characters with their own arsenal of moves each -- all of which must be utilized in different situations and areas for maximum success. Donkey Kong is the only ape that can smash away dirt patches for five banana medals, for example. Chunky Kong is the only ape that can lift big rocks. Tiny Kong is the only one capable of shrinking in size to crawl through miniscule holes. Diddy Kong can fly. Lanky can climb up hills and float to new areas.
For the record while I finished Yoshi's Island DS, I never got further than a few hours into Donkey Kong 64 (reason: too tedious and frustrating).
While fundamental flaws like the one outlined here will not necessarily ruin a game's playability, I posit that they severely hamper the player's enjoyment of them. These flaws should be identified and avoided at all costs. I hope that the designers at Nintendo and its second party affiliates can recognize this problem and start producing more masterpieces like the original Yoshi's Island.
Recent Blog Posts
| List: | 07/03/07 - Fundamental Flaws in Game Design 06/28/07 - On Personification and the Power of Metaphor |
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Submit your own resources!| Craig Fortune (Jul 03, 2007 at 03:36 GMT) |
Quote:
A fundamental flaw in game design is any design that interferes with the player's learning. Games, at their core, require constant learning in order to elicit the elusive sense of "fun".
I read this as you are implying that what is key to a game is the learning of the game itself. To understand the rules, the world, etc and to constantly 'update' your knowledge of the game is what I read as a potential definition you would use for what constitutes game-play. I'm assuming you are a pure ludologist in terms of games yes? (For those wondering wtf ludology is, its the opinion that a game is made up of purely rules, boundaries etc. Narratology, the 'opposite', is the description for the opinion that a game is a story telling medium of sorts. I've personally never felt that solitaire tells me an epic story of differently playing cards in a greek-tragedy esque manner... Someone working on that game yet? No? Get on it.)
I believe a game is purely constructed on its interactivity (Its what games have as unique as opposed to other art forms). Learning is part of this, but it is not its entirety. Learning is (hopefully) rapid at the beginning, and by a certain (somewhat early) point the player should have nearly all the knowledge they could get on a game already in their head. What they have then is the ability to utilise their knowledge in the form of interaction. Learning is the stepping stone to fun, fun it born out of good game design, good game design is all about the interactive experience.
I say nearly all the knowledge as this is how we distinguish between an average player and a great player of a certain game. The great player has a better understanding of the game/genre/whatever. So one has yet more to learn than the other, but Who is having more fun? Impossible to say. So learning cant be the 'fun' factor, interactivity has to be.
| Eric Robinson (Jul 03, 2007 at 05:05 GMT) |
That opening line was intended to be short and simple. Indeed books have been written about that idea. I'll mention a few as I respond.
I read this as you are implying that what is key to a game is the learning of the game itself. To understand the rules, the world, etc and to constantly 'update' your knowledge of the game is what I read as a potential definition you would use for what constitutes game-play.
It's actually quite a bit more complex than that. If you read my previous .plan entry you'll see that I regard metaphor extremely highly. I would use metaphor to define games themselves: metaphors that express systems in other [potentially] more relatable terms. Gameplay, then, is the player's interactions with the system.
I'm assuming you are a pure ludologist in terms of games yes? (For those wondering wtf ludology is, its the opinion that a game is made up of purely rules, boundaries etc. Narratology, the 'opposite', is the description for the opinion that a game is a story telling medium of sorts.)
I wouldn't classify myself as either. In fact, I believe that games are somewhat a mixture of the two -ologies that you mentioned.
I believe a game is purely constructed on its interactivity (Its what games have as unique as opposed to other art forms). Learning is part of this, but it is not its entirety. Learning is (hopefully) rapid at the beginning, and by a certain (somewhat early) point the player should have nearly all the knowledge they could get on a game already in their head. What they have then is the ability to utilise their knowledge in the form of interaction.
I have to disagree. I would say that a game is not a game without interactivity, sure. However, I would not say that "a game is purely constructed on its interactivity". You can have interactivity that does not result in gameplay. During the first half of On Interactive Storytelling, Chris Crawford goes into great detail about just this topic (I do not agree with everything he says but feel that his discussion of interactivity is second-to-none). Interactivity is merely a piece of the puzzle.
And I agree that learning is not the entirety of a game but I do believe that it lies at the core. I would, however, argue that interactivity without learning would be boring/frustrating. (Note that I do not purport to make the following statement: "Interactivity" + "Learning" = Game.) This is why I classify the "Bus Stop" mechanic above as a fundamental flaw: it disrupts the learning; the player's exploration of the game's systems.
And this is getting deeper into my use of the term "learning". I do not intend the term to apply simply to controls or the implementation of mechanics (e.g. how high the game allows me to jump). I mentioned above that games are in a way a metaphor of a system. Learning, then, is the exploration of that system. You mentioned Solitaire. Well, how do you know which pile to move the card to? A new player will likely dump cards down onto the growing stacks but experienced players may recognize the need to hold off because they see a way in which that would significantly hamper progress in the future. As we play solitaire and see more and more situations and become more and more familiar with something; we start to understand the kinds of moves that work best. If you haven't already, read Blink. It goes into detail about this kind of 'understanding'.
So yes, there's overt learning and there's covert learning. Overt learning is what you find in manuals. Covert learning is what you find at the core of a game. It is the latter that I intend in the post above.
Learning is the stepping stone to fun, fun it born out of good game design, good game design is all about the interactive experience.
Learning, as you've described it, is the player's grasp of the game's controls and mechanics. How, then, is that the stepping stone to fun? That is certainly the stepping stone to interaction with the game but I wouldn't take it any further.
You next say that "fun is born out of good game design." What then makes up good game design? The third piece seems to equate good game design with the "interactive experience". But where does that get us? What is the interactive experience? Isn't that just "playing the game?" If so, then doesn't that statement above qualify as a kind of tautology?
I say nearly all the knowledge as this is how we distinguish between an average player and a great player of a certain game. The great player has a better understanding of the game/genre/whatever. So one has yet more to learn than the other, but Who is having more fun? Impossible to say. So learning cant be the 'fun' factor, interactivity has to be.
I don't think you can say that. Let's take an FPS as an example. Part of the knowledge that one acquires in an FPS game is how to fire, when to fire, when to jump, how to hide, how to dodge, the speed of the weapons, the likelihood that an enemy will have X gun, where to find cover, where enemies will come from. Someone who is godlike in Counter-Strike 1.5's de_dust map may be absolutely terrible at UT2k4 because they don't understand the vehicles, the weapons, or even the difference in jumping. The maps are completely different, too. That de_dust god may be terrible at de_aztec. Certainly their knowledge of weapons and such will save them time but they might just run into a hallway and get mowed down. It takes time to learn the ins and outs of a level and to develop effective strategies. It's this kind of learning that keeps people coming back to FPS games. If it weren't for customized maps, FPS games would be released and quickly fizzle into obscurity.
And in terms of having "more fun"? How do you measure the amount of fun someone is having? To me that's entirely subjective.
Finally, I never equate learning with fun. I merely say that learning is requisite:
Quote:
Games, at their core, require constant learning in order to elicit the elusive sense of "fun". When the learning process is hampered, games become either frustrating or boring. Note that this learning is not learning in the classical sense but learning as can be defined by "the process of coming to understand a system." That said, let's move to the meat of the argument.
Edited on Jul 03, 2007 05:09 GMT
| Phil Carlisle (Jul 03, 2007 at 08:55 GMT) |
I agree that it definitely doesnt help the flow of a player if they are exploring and seeing new possibilities in a level. I also agree that I cant see what the bus stop concept adds to the overall design. But I assume whoever designed it had a concrete case in mind of WHY they should use the bus stop.
Is it to enforce the constraint of having one character to the point where the player has to consider wether the character switch would be "worth it"? I think maybe this is it. It posits the notion of cost to the player. The cost of running to the nearest bus stop in order to switch vs the cost of progressing forward.
Now my argument breaks down if the level is only traversable using a switched character. But I'm not clear thats the case.
| Barry Gallagher (Jul 03, 2007 at 15:46 GMT) |
If there wasnt a "bus stop" mechanic it would be merely a case of changing characters by say hitting the start button or such. Which would then basically make it just another platformer.
It sounds like a case of trying to pass of complexity as depth.
Personally I generally hate backtracking in games. Those journeys dont seem to get any more fun the second time around.
| Craig Fortune (Jul 03, 2007 at 15:54 GMT) |
Quote:
"You can have interactivity that does not result in gameplay"
Example? I haven't read the book.
Quote:
"And in terms of having "more fun"? How do you measure the amount of fun someone is having? To me that's entirely subjective."
Erm, I did say "Impossible to say." after that :P
Quote:
"Games, at their core, require constant learning in order to elicit the elusive sense of "fun."
I know how to play minesweeper, (I'm keeping to 'basic' games here for the sake of simplicity) I'm not really learning it anymore now, I'm utilising my knowledge in the method of interaction... I still find it fun. Constant learning required = well, bluntly put: wrong in my opinion.
Quote:
"It's this kind of learning that keeps people coming back to FPS games"
Erm, the interactivity required to learn is what is the core of a good game. You can have a game where there are many, many, things to learn, doesn't make it fun though...
Quote:
"If so, then doesn't that statement above qualify as a kind of tautology?"
Yes, thats my point... I believe it to be a simple rule, interaction = game-play essentially. I believe that good game design is all about quality interactivity, (Quality doesn't mean complex or deep etc), fun is born from this. You need to learn a game's game-play dynamics to have any chance of interacting 'properly' to find it fun.
I learn from a film as I watch it, I learn from a game as I play it. But what makes a game a game? Interaction.
-Craig.
ps: Interaction.
pps: Interaction :)
| Barry Gallagher (Jul 03, 2007 at 16:50 GMT) |
Different people prefer different types of interaction. Or simply put different people like different games.
The hard part is the "Quality interaction" part. For example an ATM is interactive, doesnt mean I want to stay there any longer then 5 seconds.
I suppose I personally lean more towards ludology then the narrative side as I believe competition is a big part of most games (Definitely not all, but most), for me atleast. For example if me and a friend were trying to use two ATM's side by side I would enjoy racing them.
Competing against the computer, while less fulfilling is still fun.
I just don't really get games like Pokemon snap and such. They wouldnt entertain me for long.
At its very base though I think a game is just "FUN", wether it be with or without rules though as said I personally prefer the competitive type of games.
| Craig Fortune (Jul 03, 2007 at 17:17 GMT) |
I feel the birth of a new, somewhat expensive, sport in that sentence right there :D
| Eric Robinson (Jul 04, 2007 at 01:09 GMT) |
1) It makes the game potentially clearer for the player. With a bus stop the player will know that they have one set of abilities until they reach another bus stop and need not worry about dynamic "tool management".
2) It makes the game longer. Yoshi's Island DS is a handheld game and the levels would be significantly shortened if they remained unchanged and you lost the Bus Stop.
3) Development time constraints. When you have a deadline, simple level design is easier to test. You could certainly string together sections where the player would have to switch between tool set fairly quickly but that could also create multiple paths through a level. By limiting the player to one "tool" at a time, you can better see the limits of their reach within a level. This boils down to development complexity, I guess (though I do argue that the game would be tons more fun if the user was allowed the dynamic tool switching).
Quote:
Is it to enforce the constraint of having one character to the point where the player has to consider wether the character switch would be "worth it"? I think maybe this is it. It posits the notion of cost to the player. The cost of running to the nearest bus stop in order to switch vs the cost of progressing forward.
I do not believe this to be the case. As you play the game you find that you may need to reach all of the places you originally couldn't (pre-switch). One of the final levels has you searching for keys that unlock a door. In that level you have to visit every one of those things. All of the switching gets really irritating in that level. Further, while the game is a platformer it is definitely not your standard Mario-esque point-A to point-B sidescroller: you run around in all four D-Pad directions fairly equally.
@Barry:
Quote:
If there wasnt a "bus stop" mechanic it would be merely a case of changing characters by say hitting the start button or such. Which would then basically make it just another platformer.
It sounds like a case of trying to pass of complexity as depth.
Personally I generally hate backtracking in games. Those journeys dont seem to get any more fun the second time around.
That's my point exactly. The "Bus Stop" mechanic is simply not necessary and causes highly unnatural flow in the game's play. The feeling I got playing the game was that the designers were trying to lengthen playtime and increase the amount of traffic that they could get out of previously designed areas - you know, maximize the level-design-time/level-play-time ratio. This also specifically limits level design and keeps things really simple; too simple, I'd say. By about halfway through the game I started thinking to myself "Damnit, another Vine? Where's that damn bus stop so I can switch to DK... Gaaaahhhh...."
@Craig:
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Lud vs Narr: Good, I hate it went people say only one is true. Narr is definitely not true, as per my solitaire example.
I agree. I tend to stand in the middle on lots of stuff (I'm American and I stay Independent because I don't believe any party has it perfect). I wouldn't say that one's not true but I would argue that both of the ~ologies have something to offer and are worth a little bit of time to look into. Heh.
As for an example of interactivity that doesn't result in gameplay, see above! We're interacting with one another in a conversation (you could argue that any time you play a game you are conversing with it: the language may not be a standard spoken language but you certainly have input and output). Fishing is another potential example. You cast your line and the fish react. Casual fishing is another example (you could potentially argue that competitive fishing is a game).
The point is that if you say "If X is interactive, X = Game" you open the door to just about everything.
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Erm, I did say "Impossible to say." after that :P
Touche. I guess I didn't really connect the dots there when I was selecting stuff to respond to. D'oh!
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I know how to play minesweeper, (I'm keeping to 'basic' games here for the sake of simplicity) I'm not really learning it anymore now, I'm utilising my knowledge in the method of interaction... I still find it fun. Constant learning required = well, bluntly put: wrong in my opinion.
I, too, know how to play Minesweeper. I learned how to play that game back in Junior High School while waiting for responses from friends in the new-fangled chat feature implemented by AOL. That is to say that I learned the rules of the game. Knowing those rules, however, I still found myself unable to beat an "Advanced" board. I quickly conquered "Beginner" setting but it was quite a while before I started to do well with the "Advanced" settings. I'm not learning how to interact with the game anymore (click on a square, right click to flag a square, etc.) but I am still learning probabilities and likelihoods of bomb/bomb cluster locations. I've certainly found that my "guessing" has improved over the years. Remember in school when teachers would tell you to go with your first guess on a standardized test? It's a very similar thing. You're first guess gets better and better because you're learning what works and what doesn't. Again this is not overt learning like the controls of a game, but covert: something that your brain subconsciously picks up on. The book Blink mentioned above goes into the power of this type of learning and thinking.
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Erm, the interactivity required to learn is what is the core of a good game. You can have a game where there are many, many, things to learn, doesn't make it fun though...
I agree with your second sentence. What you mention there is what I would call "feature bloat". If you make a system so complex that the player must track umpteen different variables, buttons, statistics, etc. then the game will not be approachable.
However, I would say that interactivity is not at the core of the game but is the path to the core. At the core of every game is a system. These systems vary drastically in design and certain methods of interaction are better suited to different systems. Some games are also packages of different systems that are woven masterfully together.
This may help explain why I still pick up Tetris occassionally. The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time was just voted Greatest Game Ever but I haven't had an urge to play it since I beat it back in High School. While I agree that that game was incredible, I do not find myself constantly itching to play it again. On the other hand, I've been playing various upgrades of Tetris since I got my Gameboy back in 1989 or so and still find myself trying to get new higher scores. I understood how to play Tetris five minutes after opening the package but still find myself honing in my skills by learning what moves will yield more Tetris' with the least amount of 'pit-cap' risk. It takes time to learn what works and what doesn't. Zelda has you interacting in many various ways while Tetris has extremely limited interactivity. They're both good but there's only one that I will repeatedly go back to. Handheld or no.
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Yes, thats my point... I believe it to be a simple rule, interaction = game-play essentially. I believe that good game design is all about quality interactivity, (Quality doesn't mean complex or deep etc), fun is born from this. You need to learn a game's game-play dynamics to have any chance of interacting 'properly' to find it fun.
Where does this get us, though? "Interaction = Gameplay" doesn't yield any platform on which to stand to discuss the effectiveness of gameplay mechanics. I say that learning is requisite for games (I mean covert learning at this point) and I can use that to point out what I believe to be a flawed mechanic: something that developers can look out for in their own designs and avoid. With your statement it works out as follows: "The bus stop is interactive. Therefore it is gameplay. It isn't Quality Interaction, however, because it's not fun. Well... why?" What is Quality Interactivity? You cannot simply say "Quality Interactivity is interactivity that yields fun" because you've simply gone around in a circle.
Certainly "play" is carried out through interaction. It is what the player is interacting with that is important. Yes, you must learn a game's mechanics to be able to interact with the systems that it presents to you but the actual play is borne out of experimentation and exploration of the system presented. (I refer to systems amorphously to keep it as general as possible. Give a system a shape and you've started to define the type of game.)
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I learn from a film as I watch it, I learn from a game as I play it. But what makes a game a game? Interaction.
A person viewing a film is analogous to a student attending a lecture. You listen and then are left to digest the material as you see fit. If you see fault with the content then you either steam about it for a while (maybe write a scathing letter or review or something) or shrug off the whole thing as a waste of time. A game, though... a game is like getting that vaunted chemistry set for your birthday. Except better. In the chemistry set you're limited to safe materials. In a "chemistry set" game you could mix all the materials that you wanted. Sure, mixing vile A with vile B may actually yield a chaotically exothermic reaction, resulting in the death of your avatar but you are safe. You then go back and don't mix vile A with vile B because you've learned that A+B=kablooey. It isn't the interaction that makes the chemistry game a game, it's the learning [in this case by trial and error] that makes it a game. Interactivity is requisite but it is not the be-all-end-all.
@Barry:
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At its very base though I think a game is just "FUN", wether it be with or without rules though as said I personally prefer the competitive type of games.
First of all, do you have an example of a game that doesn't have rules? And second, putting "Fun" at the core of your definition of "game" is dangerous. It doesn't get you anywhere in the end as the term is so incredibly subjective. If that were the case then my argument in this post would have boiled down to "The 'Bus Stop' is a bad game mechanic because it is not fun."
Take a look at A Theory of Fun for Game Design. I cannot recommend this book enough. It's engaging, easy to follow, and simply brilliant. Buy it. Read it. Love it.
Is it really that good? I found this quote on the book's website. According to David Jaffe (designer of God of War)
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"...it's the best game design book I have ever read. There was this pretty deceptive sample download going around the net 6 months back that made the whole book look like a bunch of cartoons that you could read in like 5 minutes....but the book is SO MUCH MORE than that...and SO MUCH BETTER. I think any and everyone who designs games (and aspires to) should read this book...it explains alot of stuff I have never thought about and articulates alot of the stuff I've always thought about but have never taken the time (or had the skillz) to put into words....such a good fucking book....please read it."
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Note: I am no where near as satisfied with the second half of this post as I was when I first wrote it. Sorry if it's tough to follow... I really didn't look forward to rewriting everything. Read the next comment for an explanation if this note doesn't make sense.
Edited on Jul 04, 2007 04:59 GMT
| Eric Robinson (Jul 04, 2007 at 01:20 GMT) |
Good call Garage Games. I put a stress mark over the word "touche" above, as per the correct spelling, and the comment system threw out that letter and everything that followed it!!!
Please upgrade the software. Please, please, please, please. This system is terribly archaic and prone to data loss.
The offending character was about half-way through my post. Meaning that I lost a lot of comments. Wasted time = not happy me.
[/rant]
| Craig Fortune (Jul 04, 2007 at 04:21 GMT) |
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As for an example of interactivity that doesn't result in gameplay, see above! We're interacting with one another in a conversation
Now you knew I meant interaction in a game environment, lets not get silly :P
I said:
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"interaction = game-play essentially"
Let me rephrase myself slightly as I'm not happy with that. This is better and probably more agreeable to you and me both.
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"interaction gives game-play essentially"
About minesweeper, I really dont see how you are learning still, as soon as I knew the rules I could complete all difficulty modes. The placement of mines is innately random etc, the only difference was that it took longer on harder difficulty settings as the grid was physically larger.
Moving on... What is Quality Interactivity? Well I see it as something that is unique to each game. Its that X factor that no one can describe, but everyone knows it when its there. (and conversely REALLY KNOW IT when its not, lol) This is what makes a design (and indeed a designer) quality ;)
Finally, Thanks again for posting this blog up, its refreshing to have a mature and quality (haha, just had to slip that in there) discussion given that our forum is on the internet. I'm looking forward to your next installment.
Edited on Jul 04, 2007 04:21 GMT
| Eric Robinson (Jul 04, 2007 at 06:34 GMT) |
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Now you knew I meant interaction in a game environment, lets not get silly :P
Call me silly but I actually wasn't certain of that.
...
Funny that you call me silly... my username is SillyMrMan. ;D.
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"interaction gives game-play essentially"
I find this much more agreeable, yes. Good stuff.
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About minesweeper, I really dont see how you are learning still, as soon as I knew the rules I could complete all difficulty modes. The placement of mines is innately random etc, the only difference was that it took longer on harder difficulty settings as the grid was physically larger.
It's not that you were technically capable of completing those difficulty modes, but that you could do so with extremely high accuracy in short time periods. If that's how it was for you then you're some kind of lucky. I specifically remember points where I had to guess and said "Well, that was a silly move." After playing the game enough I learned what a 'typical' distribution of bombs looks like with the different settings. At that point I knew that if I was against a wall of bombs that if I went two or three deep into the gray area that I'd have a higher likelihood of not 'asploding' myself (not 100% sure of the accuracy there but fairly sure). You have to guess at some points (including right off the bat) in that game. Certainly some of it is luck (right off the bat guess, for example) but a lot of it becomes educated guesswork. I've come across boards where I had a block of four question blocks surrounded by bombs. I could have guessed at them before moving on or I might have saved them for later to see if there were any bombs left after I had potentially cleared the board... and then what if there happen to be other unknowable areas? Sometimes this falls to luck but sometimes a more experienced player will make a 'smarter move' than an unexperienced one.
For the record, I can only play Minesweeper so much before I have to put it away for a few months because it gets boring/irritating (I once cleared all but two boxes in advanced. They were cut off from any information and in the corner. I took a stab and I lost. Then I closed the game).
Seriously, man. Take a look at the book I linked above. It's incredibly good. Even if you don't agree with it it will inform you of one of the big theories being touted in this day and age.
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Moving on... What is Quality Interactivity? Well I see it as something that is unique to each game. Its that X factor that no one can describe, but everyone knows it when its there. (and conversely REALLY KNOW IT when its not, lol) This is what makes a design (and indeed a designer) quality ;)
I take issue with explanation by X-Factor. If fun is created by the X-Factor then I couldn't recommend a specific change as I did above to make a game potentially better. Now, I haven't implemented that change to prove that it works better but I definitely get the sense that it would make for a more enjoyable experience. The analogy I used in the .plan is an attempt to explain why that is in relatable terms.
Games are produced and played. If anything I would say that the player, by bringing their preconceptions and artistic hangups (visual, aural), provides an X-Factor. But that's about as far as I'd take that term.
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Finally, Thanks again for posting this blog up, its refreshing to have a mature and quality (haha, just had to slip that in there) discussion given that our forum is on the internet. I'm looking forward to your next installment.
No problem. That's exactly the reason I posted it here (it was originally posted on my personal blog). I enjoy this kind of discussion and really helps you think about your preconceptions in different ways. To wit: the whole Resident Evil example above was originally given as a counterpoint in a conversation I had with a good friend. Discussion = grand.d
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