Divide Progress Into Discrete Units
Defeating an enemy; overcoming an obstacle; surviving in the face of adversity: success and failure are at the very core of the game-player's experience. Games offer players a number of choices, some...
View ArticleBad Interface: Dragon Quest VIII
The game: Dragon Quest VIIIThe background: In a battle against a group of monsters, a player who wishes to attack has to first choose the "attack" option from within the game's "fight" menu, and then...
View ArticleRemembering Goals
The issue: Certain kinds of games require that players keep one or more specific goals in mind as they play. Players who return to a game after a long absence may find it difficult to remember what...
View ArticleDesign Flaw: Zelda: The Wind Waker
The game:Zelda: The Wind WakerThe background: One of the islands in the game, the largest of the Mother and Child Isles, is impossible to reach on foot. A talking fish that's swimming in the area tells...
View ArticleBad Interface: Civilization IV
The game:Civilization IVThe background: Numerous times over the course of the game the player is asked to choose from a list technologies that determine the units and improvements available in play....
View ArticleDesign Flaw: In Your Face
The Game: In Your FaceThe background: In Your Face is a street basketball game for the original Nintendo Game Boy. At the beginning of every game, a coin-flip animation is shown to represent the...
View ArticleGame Design Questions
Some questions every game designer should ask during the game development process:Are the game's interfaces and user controls consistent throughout the game? If they're not, is there a good reason why...
View ArticleWalkthrough? I Don't Need No Steenking Walkthrough!
Principle: If a game requires a strategy guide or walkthrough to complete, it's broken. If the game may be completed without one but nevertheless provokes a not insignificant number of players to...
View ArticleMeaningful Mistakes
Principle: Sometimes a player's mistakes aren't really mistakes.If a player has no good reason to believe a particular action might lead to failure, then failure should not be blamed on the...
View ArticleCause and Effect
Principle: Avoid responding to the player's actions with behavior that is contrary to reasonable player expectations, as it breaks the implied "contract" between the player and the game...
View ArticleFailure by Random Numbers
Failure by random numbers can occur whenever the random processes that determine failure aren't significantly influenced by the player's choices, giving players little or no meaningful control over the...
View Article[Offtopic] Software Activation and IP Ownership
Softimage XSI has recently been acquired by Autodesk, the company that owns competing packages 3ds Max and Maya. Users who've purchased XSI through its former owner will now have to deal with Autodesk...
View ArticleMoving Around in 2 and 3 Dimensions
Here are some differences between ground-level 3D and top-down 2D environments, and their implications for ease of navigation:The way the shapes of objects change as the player moves around the game...
View ArticleEmotions in Games
Authors and filmmakers who wish to evoke particular emotions in their audience often rely on the audience's ability to empathize with the characters portrayed in the narrative, and especially with the...
View ArticleSaving, Reloading and Player Failure
When the subject of free versus restricted saving comes up, people often end up conflating the issues of players being free to save their progress at any time and games requiring players to replay...
View ArticleA History of the Amiga
A History of the Amiga, from Ars Technica:Part 1: GenesisPart 2: The birth of AmigaPart 3: The first prototypePart 4: Enter CommodorePart 5: Postlaunch bluesPart 6: Stopping the bleedingPart 7: Game on!
View ArticleControlling Aspect Ratio in Unity
Games made with Unity allow users to pick a screen resolution on startup through Unity's Display Resolution Dialog. While it's possible to disable this feature and force a game to use a particular...
View ArticleNarrative and Consequences
The holy grail of narrative game design is a game with a carefully constructed narrative that players can influence to the same degree as their real lives. The goal is to have stories that are every...
View ArticlePlay to Conceive
Principle: Play without a purpose for new or better experiences.As you develop your game, engage in unstructured play to get a feel for the game's mechanics and the gameplay opportunities they offer....
View ArticleDon't think "random", think "statistics"
Principle: Make die rolls random, but outcomes statistical.While dice and other random number generators may appear to go against the notion that players should be in control of their fate, they are,...
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