XV - Game Level Design

There are many things a game needs to be successful and level design plays a huge part in how well it does. You can have the best idea for a game ever, but if the levels don’t fit well within the game then it will fail. Here’s a list of the core features a game requires:

1. Concept
2. Environment
3. Beginning
4. Ending
5. Goal
6. Challenges between the player and the goal
7. Reward
8. Defeat or failure system

Story is another area that is fundamental, but not overly required in every game. Although it can be the driving point behind certain genres of a game, many games work well without any story or theme at all. However these games that have no storyline could have had one, a story can drive the player through the many different levels of a game. 

If you think of chess and battle chess, battle chess is the same concept with a story build into it, whereas chess and computer games like battle simulators allows the players to generate their own narrative and make their own AAR (After Action Report) into a custom story, if the player is thinking of this during the game, it can change the way he plays to make his AAR more exciting. 

The challenge in level design needs to increase as the player progresses through the game, but in each level the player needs to almost immediately recognize what he needs to do, whether or not what he does is the correct way to complete the challenges set in motion does not matter as long as they don’t end up sitting back thinking ‘I don’t know what I need to do next’ as this leads to frustration and boredom. 

Each game has its own set of rules that govern how everything works. Whether it follows the real world rules of things like gravity absolutely, partially or not at all can change how the player thinks of the game state. If each level in a game has different rules then the player can get confused, or will take a longer amount of time figuring out how the items in the world will work, this extra amount of time will eventually seem pointless to the player over the course of the entire game as they relearn the rules set within the game state and they will lose interest with the extra work required to play.

It’s also a good idea to have multiple paths that lead to the final destination, each providing its own tools and challenges as this gives variety to the player resulting in replayability and extra enjoyment for the player. This also works within a single level, if there are a couple of different methods of completion then the player can pick and choose on how to play the game, giving the illusion that the player is the playing the game their own way.  These tools may not all be directly compatible, but as long as they work under the rules set in the game, then the player will understand how to use them. 

The rewards of a level can be as simple as progression to the next level, but I think it is wise to give the player something extra as I believe that getting something as obvious and expected as progression looks like laziness on the developers part. Getting a bonus achievement in a game makes the player feel like they have accomplished something difficult and this will make the player feel better about themselves and thus the game. Points are generally the easiest way to reward a player, this can be things like the score or the amount of items received but it can include things like the type or quality.

I found this week’s reading a bit overly exemplified, yet still interesting. The way it broke down the stages I think is going to help me in designing any game that I will ever work on, whether I use that process or not, it still got me thinking about how I should structure the design of a level.

XIV - Hearts, Clubs, Diamonds, Spades: Players who suit MUDs

In the titled document written by Richard A. Bartle he discusses and defines the character types that play muds in detail and how to interact with them to control the game state. He stated that there are 4 key things people enjoy in a MUD:

1.       Achievement

a.       Game related goals, things that are hard to get

2.       Exploration

a.       Discover game world secrets

b.      Experiment with the games mechanics and physics

3.       Socialising

a.       Communicate and role play

4.       Impose upon others

a.       Use the means provided to cause distress or aid to others (the latter not being so popular)

Break down players into 4 core categories and what they want/think about. These are listed as single categories without them affecting  each other, of course in any game a player will be a mix of all four if even only on a small scale:

·         Achievers

o   Points / levels

o   Items

o   Status

·         Socializers

o   Forge player / people relationships

o   Empathy towards others

o   Status

·         Explorers

o   Find hidden features

o   Learn how things work

o   Status

·         Killers

o   Player versus Player combat

o   Status 

The one thing they all have in common is that they all desire the status of being the best at what they do in their field. I believe that achievers are the one global trait that all the others will have; it is just human nature to want to do the best they can and be recognised for that accomplishment. 

After that is socializing, each class will also socialise in one way or another, whether it be discussing battle plans amongst killers, or trading information amongst explorers, they all communicate to achieve their goals. 

Exploring is something that every player does when they first enter a game, they need to discover how it all works or else they will be stumbling around in the dark never knowing what to do. Whether they keep it up once they have a functional understanding of the games core mechanics or not does not change the fact that they, at one time or another have explored how the game works. 

Killers are the last category and probably the only category that could possibly be ignored by a player. Some people simply have no intention of wanting to cause harm to another, but at the same time also do not wish to be harmed and as these games generally revolve around combat for advancement through the game, they will have built at least a basic setup of which to defend themselves from the environment which could also be used to defend them from other players too.

There are 2 ways these 4 groups of players play a game:

Killers act > players
Achievers Act > World
Socializers interact > players
Explorers interact > world

There is also a big section on how each class of player interacts with one another; however I believe it to be extremely out dated towards today’s market. Perhaps it made sense for MUDs, but saying things along the lines of a so called ‘killer’ avoiding other killers is entirely untrue. Each of these classes of player is never pure, you do not get a player who only socializes, they will go and do dungeons, they will go and pvp with other players, this is the same for each and every class.

I suppose it could be true at its very core, talking about a ‘killer’ in the sense of only wanting to kill others, but there is no pure ‘killer’ class of player and with their need for status they would want the reward of killing the best and strongest opponents, their ‘natural prey’ would be other killers and not the achievers as said in the document.

This document went on to saying how if one type of player is increased, that it would affect the quantity of another type. I believe that it is also not entirely true on the same basis as before. 

• Killers are only interested in fighting other veteran opponents who are going to give them a challenge, more exciting to know that the kill was earned rather than predetermined before the battle began.

• Socializers want more of every class so that they can socialise with them and talk about them to others

• Explorers want fewer explorers and more of every other class so they can use their findings to their advantage over the rest.

• Achievers want more of every class so they can compete amongst other great achievers and be better than them, making the achievement all that more valuable, whilst also having a large audience to which they can display their greatness. 

To increase the amount of one type of player you need to make adjustments to the game:

·         Killers

o   More options for fighting, different types of fights, fair fights and non-fair fights – control over how they fight.

·         Socializers

o   Social gathering zones, homeland locations that are safe spots were they can gather and communicate without fear. 

·         Explorers

o   Expand the game, give it more and better stuff, with canon fluff for them to discover.

·         Achievers

o   On a similar note to explorers, the simple way of getting more achievers is to add more official achievements in the game and the ability for the players to make their own goals via in game information and meta-game, i.e. players with most points, best gear etc.

At first, this document aggravated me. Being an active participant in MMOs over the past few years I found the majority of this data to be incorrect. However once I reread the article and thought of it from a MUD perspective and also considered how out of date it was, I decided to look at the information differently. 

Knowing that the data needs to be updated to correspond to the evolution of a MUD, the MMO I realised how many of the things discussed in the writings had been achieved since and how, even though the different archetypes no longer match the criteria set for them, they still resemble their former selves giving fashion on how to manipulate them with the set rules – even if these rules need to be bended slightly to work in today’s market.

‘;..;’

SM - iHK

XIII - Space of possibility and pacing in casual game design

As of recent years video gaming has become less of a foolish past time as the industry has grown, this is most evident in the Nintendo console, the Wii. A lot of its games are party or family based games that are quick to pick up and learn and have multiple challenges within for the player to continue to struggle with.

The reason that the Wii was so immensely successful was that it adopted group based, casual games and started to produce them on a large scale. This attracted not only the younger gamer audience, but people from all age groups who could play these casual games as a social activity because they are simple to play. Key points about why casual games like those on the Wii, or those made by PopCap are below:

·         Casual games 

o   Less Complex controls, gameplay and involvement. Their simplistic nature allows the player to pick up the game on a whim, play for a little while and then stop again. The games can still be complex, but it is a complex interaction of smaller objects that hides the games advanced nature, this will be explained later on.

·         Space of possibility 

o   Relates to player experience, covers all possible actions the player can make, the creation of structure that will play out in unpredictable ways.

·         Pacing

o   Overall rhythm of the game. This is the speed at which different parts of a game are put in motion; it crafts a players experience through MDA via relaxation, tension, repetition. The designer paces the game

There are two arch’s to pacing, the lower arch contains the relevant mechanics to keep a player involved in a game, and the upper arch is how long it takes the player to get bored with the game. The Lower arch is made up of, but not limited to:

·         Tension – The perceived danger, the illusion that your may become the weakest side in the games conflict.

·         Threat – This is when the players react to the power of opposing forces, effecting  the games state.

·         Movement impetus – The want to move forward, pushing the player towards a goal, make the player want to start and continue playing a game.

·          Tempo – The intensity of play, time between each significant decision that the player makes. Too fast can cause  ‘analysis paralysis’ were the player cannot keep up and starts to lose track of what is going on, too slow and the player will get bord.

In a casual game, large game space generates too many patterns of play, the player will be left with not enough time or too much time and the game will stagnate, while also game space that is too small has limited choices and becomes boring. The technique of restring this space, to still have fun in a casual game while giving the game longevity, keeping movement impetus with the player start to finish is key to the game being successful.  

In a casual game, the player does not want to have to remember the last x amount of games to know how to play or what to do, everything can be kept in short term memory,  too much information becomes confusing and too little becomes boring. One way to avoid this situation is to slowly introduce complexity into the game so that the learning curve seems to be a lot smaller. 

In PopCaps ‘Plants vs Zombies’ they do this by limiting the amount of enemy types and methods of which to destroy them slowly giving you more options. By the end of the game you have a pretty big arsenal that would be quite staggering to a new player, its due to a pattern of continuous learning that the player is able to easily absorb all this information and still enjoy the game on a casual basis.  

This topic has showed me how complex a casual game can be if the information is given to the player in small pieces. The patterns that the player plays through to complete a game becoming more intricate as they progress from a small game into a bigger more interesting game are more complicated than I would of first assumed.  

‘;..;’

SM – iHK

XII - Chance Verse Skill

Chance in a game

Most games contain some factors that are random or not repeatable, that is because they are an important aspect to most games. Games with a focus on luck, are easier to approach for casual gamers as they do not have to put as much effort into finding the patterns of skill to the game, in short, it allows a game to be learned a lot faster. 

Even though the game is harder if at all possible to be mastered, so long as the gameplay does not become to overly repetitive or boring to the player, they will continue to play on and try to do as well as possible with their limited control over the game. This is due to the chance to luckily score high even though there is the possibility of playing for an extended period of time and get nothing, there is also the chance to play for a short period of time and get everything all along with minimal effort.

Delay or Prevent solvability 

A game is solvable if the possibility space is known ahead of time and can be exploited. Of course it can built into a game for the illusion of control, you can think that if you do X and then Y you will come the end of the game, but with chance there is the option that you will not get X when you aim for it and thus you must try again. Once a player solves a game, the game loses its uncertain outcome, its struggle. Chance eliminates some of this loss by making each game a different kind of struggle, whether it gets easier or harder the next play through, it is still different to the previous game.

Making game-play competitive for all players

Introducing these random elements into a competitive game, for example Mario Kart and the semi random items you receive, gives every player a chance to win, while also allowing the other players to blame bad luck for losing. Luck in a competitive game adds variety and prevents absolute mastery of the game, you can be perfect at the game, but if luck is you against you then no matter how could you are, you still have that chance of losing. The level of excitement or tension created by chance increases in direct proportion to how much you have riding on the results, since there are unknown elements the decisions become more complicated and compelling to make.

Mechanics of chance

·         Dice

o   Always random, each roll could be anything

o   Probability to a X, not a certainty

·         Cards

o   Set amount of cards in a game

o   Revealing a card effects probability of other cards in the game

o   Probability resets on collection

·         Pseudo-RNG

o   Not true random – factored in by a code, close enough 

·         Hidden info

o   Easy for a player to get confused and frustrated

o   Understand the games mechanics allows a player to attempt to track what is going on – i.e. fog of war, league of legends – not knowing what type of enemy your going up against when choosing your fighter

·         Chance and Skill

o   Measured randomness, nature of random elements are unknown and can be planned by the player. 

Elements of Strategic skill

‘We play games and enjoy the process because we are seeking to master the pattern in the game’ Ralph Koster – A Theory of Fun for Games Design

A good game is a series of interesting decisions, whether you plan on your next or not, you always decide on what to do now, chance decides a lot of your moves but there are always decisions to be made by the player. 

Types of decisions

·         Obvious Decisions

o   Clear choice to make for your benefit

o   Automating obvious decisions give room for the player to make the exciting ones

o   Add tension 2 obvious decisions makes them more interesting

·         Meaningless decisions

o   Usually better to eliminate entirely

o   Narrative with no game change, just story / aesthetic

·         Blind decisions

o   No information to base the choice on

·         Trade-off

o   Choose one or the other, cannot have both

·         Dilemma

o   Always at a loss

o   Only chose which loss is better for you

o   Effect how much of a loss it is 

·         Risk versus reward trade-offs

o   Make small safe moves

§  Low rewards

o   Make risky moves

§  Big rewards

Skill in a game enhances choice by giving the player control over what is happening. It allows the player to gather the information available and then make decisions based on the options available. Random chance can make a game feel unfair and frustrating, or boring as the player has no control over what happens. This is because pure chance doesn't have any interesting decision-making without some form of skill behind the decision.

Mechanics of skill

·         Trade-offs

o   Spend resources wisely

·         Purchase

o   Same as a trade-off

·         Limited abilities

o   One time use only

·         Dynamic abilities

o   Recharge over time

·         Explicit choice

o   Choose one or the other

·         Negotiation

o   Includes meta-game

o   Interaction skills

Overall, I think it is clear that a little bit of both is required for a successful game. An entirely tactical game can be extremely over bearing on a player, limiting its target audience to a select few hard-core gamers, while on the other hand a game based entirely on luck would be unfair to a player and eventually the player would find themselves getting bored and giving up. A good mix of the two makes things a lot more exciting and sustains gameplay over a longer period of time.

';..;'
SM – iHK