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Post by westin on Jan 26, 2019 18:52:40 GMT
Creative Allowanceby Westin KoesselIntroduction Why was your first time in a Destiny raid remarkably more exciting than your last?
Some would cite Destiny's 'feel' juxtaposed with the franchises notoriously shallow systems as the culprit for the dopaminergic delta. Some would hearken back to the good ol' days of Destiny, when raids like the Vault of Glass were apparently just 'better' than they are now. Others might even blame our inevitable disappointment on the games so-called 'overreliance' on repetition. Whatever you think the reason is, I'm here to tell you why I probably disagree. Not just about Destiny, but more specifically about the real reason any game stagnates. The best design never makes a choice for the player.
Get it? No? Okay. I'll do my best to explain why this is relevant as simply as I can. If there exists an invariably 'correct' way to play a raid, or game, or class, or even map, the player is subsequently robbed of his/her free choice and only needs to acquiesce to succeed. As long as one or even multiple predetermined ideas are forced on a player, the player is not an influential factor. He's just a warm body, on his way to the factory we call 'modern video game design' to pull a lever the very same way he pulled it yesterday. Yes, some are better and more efficient at pulling that lever than others, but that's why things get stale. That's the real reason Destiny raids aren't as fun as they once were. When you load up a raid, and you're killing a big ass knight for the 30'th time, what are the quantifiable differences between this run and your first? Well, for starters, you've already killed this boss. As I stated earlier, Some will likely argue the point of repetition, so I'll preemptively indulge. Repetition is only detrimental if every cycle is the same as the one before it. To quote a famous Romanian level designer, your map only starts to stagnate when it's played the same way over and over. Repetition is actually a boon for a designer who knows how to wield its potential. It can create a beautiful dynamic where the meta for any given game or map evolves over time. It's rare, but I've seen it. Rocket League and Melee come to mind. That's why we can't blame stagnation on reiteration alone. The foundational design theory of an experience is what matters, and I can give some examples. Imagine you're going to play The Vault of Glass. Right off the start, you have to activate and defend 3 spires by standing in them, and deterring enemies from resetting your progress. That's it. There aren't any exceptions. Once your team has figured out what Bungie wanted you to do, that's the end of your neural activity. From then on, it's muscle memory training. In a couple weeks (if that) you will have experienced everything the raid has to offer, because every encounter passed that is designed the exact same way. Even if execution is incredibly hard, you know what to do. There is no more exploration, there is no more theory crafting. You stand here, and if you die, you change nothing and do it again. See what I mean? Good Design doesn't force these choices on people. If these encounters were designed differently, they could potentially evolve and hold replay value over long periods of time as people discover and create new strategies, as well as potentially new areas via similarly open-ended levels. Cooldowns & Systems
First of all, cooldowns are a silly way to balance something. You can't give an ability integrity just by slapping on an arbitrary 14 second timer. As far as the grand scheme of a game goes, cooldowns DO balance the overall pacing and predictability of any given title. In that way, a game like Overwatch is balanced. On the other hand, you can't take something that's over-rewarding and make it okay just by making it rare. If it's stupid, it's stupid. Could one consider a tactical nuke 'balanced' if you gave it a 1 minute long cooldown? No? How about 10 minutes? It doesn't matter. If it's better than it is hard, then it's not right. In the very same way, the multitude of 'I win' buttons in games like Overwatch and Destiny aren't balanced. I don't care how long you have to wait between uses. Inversely, If a mechanic has integrity, it doesn't necessarily need a timer. This isn't to say that I think you should be able to spam everything all the time. That's not the point. The point is that you could design abilities in a way that allows the player to choose between them, which is intentionally allocated space for creativity.
Systems, on the other hand, are often packaged and communicated by the developer in a way that makes us think we have creative control. A designer will say something like 'you can do x' as if you're being allowed the freedom to do 'x', when in reality, the system was designed in a way that the only choice you have is 'x'. Things like the ability to meat shield in Gears of War 4, the ability to spartan charge in Halo after sprinting, or vaulting in PUBG come to mind. They were designed to seem like you can do more, when in reality, if anything, your options have decreased after implementation. In the same way, the lead level designer for God of War admitted to 'tricking' the player into feeling like he could explore, when in reality he knew you couldn't. Faux design is everywhere, and it all wants to look like the real thing. Is it deep, or convoluted?Let's look at a game like World of Warcraft. I often hear WoW combat referred to as one of the deepest gameplay loops of all time, but is it? I don't really think so anymore. While It took me years of playing the game to realize, WoW eventually fell right under the category of design theory I'll start calling 'predeterminism.' Once you learn every ability, every quirk, and get proficient at every ability and even every class (barring how ridiculously long this takes) it becomes apparent. Especially in the highest level of pvp. The best players literally always know what the other player is about to do. Every pro match could be boiled down to players who are all excellent at their ability 'rotations' and excellent at punishing mistakes in those rotations. That's how players win games. They don't 'make plays' because the game won't allow them to. They simply have to manage what they have better than the other team, and pounce when the opposition makes a mistake. There are no 'surprises' at even the highest level of play, because the game is just that limiting. It still takes a tremendous amount of skill because of just how many things you have to track, but at the end of the day, that's convoluted. It's hard, and impressive, but convoluted. There are a few reasons for this. First of all, there is absolutely no overlap in utility within the sandbox of abilites. For example, every class has an 'interrupt' ability that literally only interrupts casts. Multiply this straightforward utility times 30 or 40 and you have a class in WoW. Some abilites do damage, some are defensive, whatever. This system means that I'm never actually presented with many real choices. If I want to interrupt someone, I press interrupt. Combine this system with a game where there is no aiming, and only an effectively 2d space, and you actually end up with a super shallow and thought discouraging game that usually rewards the person who has put himself through more hours than the other person just to learn how to 'play correctly.'
Intentionality & Player Creativity
With those many examples in mind, you may be asking yourself how one might go about preventing 'predeterminism' within his/her map or game, and maybe more importantly, how can one design with intent and still allow for individual creativity? To be frank, I'm still trying to figure this one out myself. I have ideas, some even well implemented and successful, but this is an incredibly hard thing to nail down into one sentence, although I am positive that such a sentence could exist. For now, I will try my best to provide pointers and examples. First of all, you need to build your map or game from the ground up with merit serving as your standardized currency. If you want something that's crazy powerful, that's fine, just make sure it's crazy hard. If you commit to this philosophy, you are paving the way for true creativity to shine, because no matter what insane things people eventually come up with, you can bet it will be hard to compensate and that you won't have to touch it. And remember, adding a cooldown to something that isn't balanced doesn't actually mend your design, it just makes that unbalanced ability happen less. Second of all, you do need to design counters within your map or sandbox. This might sound contradictory, but creativity only exists and is only necessary within set limitations. The trick is to just never force a player into using your predetermined and intentionally designed counters. If the only way to succeed in any given situation is to simply obey the design, you've gone too far. Third of all, you need utility overlap. If every part of your map, or every ability, or every weapon in your game only serves one purpose, then the player doesn't really get to think any more than 'this does this.' There's no choice, contemplation, or forward thinking. Imagine a gun that also knocks you backwards when you shoot it, which would overlap movement and offensive utility. Fourth of all, keep it simple. While the phrase 'easy to learn, hard to master' is overused at this point, it still rings true as the ultimate goal. If you design a simple, open ended toolkit that only limits the player by what his own ability allows, then you don't have to worry about adding artificial depth via complications, cooldowns, or gameplay systems. Lastly, always allow for the potential of swift counter-play. People constantly cite the longer kill times in Halo as the reason for the good players ability to turn the tides of a seemingly lost battle through sheer skill, but that idea has been long since debunked. What really allows a good player to turn on an enemy, or even take out multiple enemies, is the potential for brevity. In Halo's case, the magnums perfect time to kill compared to its average time to kill is the source of this potential, along with the ability to dodge bullets. It doesn't matter how long or short fights are, what matters is that I can kill you faster than you can kill me, if I play better than you. Apply this theory to everything, including counter play opportunities in level design. If I'm good enough at something, I should be able to do it quickly, or at least faster than someone else. ConclusionOnce players learn the "right" way to play an encounter, a map, a class, or game, there is no longer any room for creative thought. The highest level will revolve around executing the already present and built in "correct" way to play. To avoid this, balance your design with player merit as your proverbial currency, create overlap in utility within your sandbox, and allow for swift counter-play. The best design never makes a choice for the player, but rather presents choice. We are facilitators, not dictators.
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Post by Soldat Du Christ on Jan 26, 2019 21:21:05 GMT
I see value in both sandbox design and linear design, they stimulate different emotions and muscles. Red dead 2 has to be one of the must retardedly restrictive games i've ever played and yet i have to say it was my favorite game of the year, because of how it made me feel. I see it more as a simulation, or interactive movie, and i think that's the only proper way to go about experiencing it or you are going to have a bad time. Idealy a game could make both fully realised but i've yet to see that happen...
You have to realise there is room for dumb fun in the industry, at the end of the day it is an extra circular activity. Alot of people work 60 hour work weeks and just want to be taken on a entertaining ride for 30 minutes to and hour after a long day, with little effort required on their part. I only see these kind of games becoming a problem when people over indulge and it starts to become a unhealthy habbit. Games like call of duty for example
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Post by westin on Jan 27, 2019 4:09:47 GMT
I see value in both sandbox design and linear design, they stimulate different emotions and muscles. Red dead 2 has to be one of the must retardedly restrictive games i've ever played and yet i have to say it was my favorite game of the year, because of how it made me feel. I see it more as a simulation, or interactive movie, and i think that's the only proper way to go about experiencing it or you are going to have a bad time. Idealy a game could make both fully realised but i've yet to see that happen... You have to realise there is room for dumb fun in the industry, at the end of the day it is an extra circular activity. Alot of people work 60 hour work weeks and just want to be taken on a entertaining ride for 30 minutes to and hour after a long day, with little effort required on their part. I only see these kind of games becoming a problem when people over indulge and it starts to become a unhealthy habbit. Games like call of duty for example That's the thing - famously 'dumb fun' games are actually the same games I cited as the better designed. Games like rocket League and Smash Bros. are the perfect concoction if stupidly addicting and fun casual gameplay, paired with some of the deepest and most dynamic top end competition of any games to exist. Seriously, it's not just that these 'living' games can be just as fun as a strictly casual game, it's that these games are more fun. With that being said, what is a casual game? It's a game that is designed to disallow creativity, a skill ceiling, precision, or intentionality. Random spread in games comes to mind. It doesn't matter how casual a person is, it doesn't matter how lightly they take games. The presence of ever expanding choices and opportunities within a game as you increase in competence is something that everyone's serotonergic system is hard wired to detect and make use of. Even when you play some so-called 'casual' smash, what's the room like? It's people laughing and talking trash, trying their best to win. Developers don't like that. They think that intentionally stunting opportunity broadens the playerbase, which is why Ad Hoc integrated random tripping in super Smash Bros Brawl, as one example. They were convinced that the incredible heights Smash Bros was reaching competitively was a detriment to the casual player, when there's just no evidence for that. The result was a mechanic that randomly decided to trip your character over, and it pissed literally everyone off. Unfair is unfair, I don't care how 'competitive' or 'casual' a game or person claims to be. Just as an additional example, do you think Fortnite is the largest game in history because it has random spread? Or random loot? No, there are plenty of other less successful games that boast the same annoying combo of unpredictability. In reality, Fortnite is Successful because the integrity and character built within the core of the game. Also, as far as linearity goes, I would likely just be repeating myself if I got into it. Just look up the design series (twitter) on the new God of War, and read closely. The lead level designer quite literally gives examples throughout the world where the 'illusion' of choice is intentionally placed to make people feel like they can explore, when they really can't. I'm not saying every game should be open world, but tell me, do you really think we're on the right track if we have to lie to people when making a game? Keep in mind I'm not just talking about level design. This whole dynamic could be likened to Porn vs a real relationship. Games like Destiny FeeL sO GoOd, but they boast little to no lasting power because of an overreliance on stagnant predeterministic design and random number generation. Additionally, I would argue that there are potentially adverse side-effects of developers making these decisions for the player. It's like taking away chess, and giving everyone checkers. Then, a month later, taking away checkers and handing everyone tic tac toe, and eventually only allowing for rock paper scissors. Think about that. It's not a harmless practice. If you treat people like they're stupid long enough, they'll eventually believe you.
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Post by Soldat Du Christ on Jan 27, 2019 8:31:35 GMT
It looks like you are trying to make several different points, most of which i agree with. I'm only trying to make one and it's not mutualy exlusive to any of yours as far as i'm aware. I'm only pointing out that dumb fun has it's place in the industry, simply put there is a an audience to justify it. The problem is that sometimes these kind of games promise more than they are capable of delivering. Animal crossing is very clearly an example of a game that is dumb fun and makes no apologues for it, call of duty is an example of a game that sometimes pretends to be something it's not, and ssb melee is an example of a game that can serve both audiences like you said
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Post by westin on Jan 27, 2019 12:24:27 GMT
It looks like you are trying to make several different points, most of which i agree with. I'm only trying to make one and it's not mutualy exlusive to any of yours as far as i'm aware. I'm only pointing out that dumb fun has it's place in the industry, simply put there is a an audience to justify it. The problem is that sometimes these kind of games promise more than they are capable of delivering. Animal crossing is very clearly an example of a game that is dumb fun and makes no apologues for it, call of duty is an example of a game that sometimes pretends to be something it's not, and ssb melee is an example of a game that can serve both audiences like you said Right, some games can serve both, which is a product of good design. Quality persists.
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Post by xzamplez on Jan 27, 2019 19:10:23 GMT
I agree with most of this, but I wouldn’t call ultimates or player abilities an “I win” button. At high level play, one of these abilities will barely make an impact. It’s when teams coordinate and use the abilities that compliment each other is when the momentum of the game can shift. But, it’s a system that relies on well designed abilities and ultimates, which I don’t believe is always the case with Overwatch.
As for giving players the illusion of choice: I would say it’s a good design decision, if you have committed to linear gameplay. Linear gameplay will always have a place in games as long as the developer wants you to experience their product exactly how they intend you to. Think about how off the Bioshock games might’ve felt if the order of discovering information about where you are and why you’re there was different.
A good write-up, though. And, like you said, Rocket League is a prime example of simple design with enough depth to be enjoyed on both ends of the spectrum. The Trials series might be another example as well. Simple concept and controls, but a steep learning curve with a lot of depth.
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Post by westin on Jan 27, 2019 23:05:29 GMT
I agree with most of this, but I wouldn’t call ultimates or player abilities an “I win” button. At high level play, one of these abilities will barely make an impact. It’s when teams coordinate and use the abilities that compliment each other is when the momentum of the game can shift. But, it’s a system that relies on well designed abilities and ultimates, which I don’t believe is always the case with Overwatch. As for giving players the illusion of choice: I would say it’s a good design decision, if you have committed to linear gameplay. Linear gameplay will always have a place in games as long as the developer wants you to experience their product exactly how they intend you to. Think about how off the Bioshock games might’ve felt if the order of discovering information about where you are and why you’re there was different. A good write-up, though. And, like you said, Rocket League is a prime example of simple design with enough depth to be enjoyed on both ends of the spectrum. The Trials series might be another example as well. Simple concept and controls, but a steep learning curve with a lot of depth. It just depends on the ability. In Destiny, basically every super is a guaranteed multi-kill because everything either aims itself or is a mass AOE. Overwatch isn't as offensive, but it's still a problem. That reminds me. Something else with Overwatch that came to mind today is how good of an example it would've been for this thread. The game was a massive success to start (for many reasons) but for the most part, I think it was because the game was a surprising shift for the industry. Pretty much every gun shot straight, there were a lot of projectiles, and in general the individual was empowered enough to make plays on his own. I remember how my team would talk shit that I was playing Genji every other game, and how I could prove them wrong. There existed predetermined and built in counter-picks, but it was never influential enough to stop a good player from just doing what he wanted. If I needed to, I could pick McCree to stop a tracer, but I rarely needed to. Now, Overwatch is on a downward trend, and videos like seagulls viral analysis on the state of the game attempt a diagnosis. You'll hear pretty much two things from that video and others. First, ultimates are uncounterable. So, basically, if you win the first fight, you snowball and run through the enemy with your ultimates, just to turn around and completely turtle when the enemy eventually gets their turn. Second, Blizzard started introducing and changing characters in a way that made counter picking mandatory if you wanted to compete, even in uncoordinated ranked solo queue. No longer can I load up the game and play the character I like the most, because half of the time I'm forced to choose between winning and playing that character.
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Post by Soldat Du Christ on Jan 28, 2019 2:21:06 GMT
I realy want to WANT to play overwatch, with each character acting as their own closed system requiring different skills to succeed. But my goodness i can't stand teamwork in that game for some reason, team comp is just too important for success. It has to be the best designed fps out their right now but it's just not an ARENA fps which makes me sad
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Post by purelyfat on Jan 29, 2019 16:31:15 GMT
You guys should check out Monster Hunter World. It has some issues but the game gives the player quite a few options as far as how they can approach hunting a monster. There are a couple weapons that are retarded but the majority of the sandbox is balanced as far as effectiveness with some being better for some monsters. The environments also have natural traps and you can somewhat lead monsters into positions to make them easier. Also, there are shit like turf wars where another monster will interrupt the fight. The game is kind of clunky and ugly but it is enjoyable. The level design is quite interesting as well.
I don't mind concept of cooldowns as controllers but like you said the ability should not be balanced by the cooldown.
Overwatch suffers from a major identity crisis. You think they would have been smarter and stuck more to what made TF2 great and tried to correct the issues the game had but they made the issues worse with more hard chokes(TF2 has more soft chokes which makes it so a team doesn't have to bottle up at it and deathball or try to jump right passed it and possible get counter dived), more shit going off on the screen and added cooldowns.
Even the way Blizzard has chosen to balance things is not very good. Rather than adding nuances to an ability that is very powerful they just change damage, speed, and cooldown time which typically causes more harm to the games balance. Causing heroes that weren't powerful before to be seen as menaces. The example I use typically is the first McCree fth nerf. Because the issue wasn't it's strength in my opinion it was the roll reload and the range of it. It was too effective at too great a range. If it only worked at point blank range similar to the mauler in H3 it would have been okay. Also, this nerf has been pretty much completely reverted now because of GOATS. Which just tells me Blizzard has no idea what they want this game to be and just react to the noisiest complainers. Which is not working as well because they can't seem to alter something enough to counter GOATS.
Overwatch pisses me off and makes me rant.
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Post by MultiLockOn on Jan 29, 2019 16:46:24 GMT
You guys should check out Monster Hunter World. It has some issues but the game gives the player quite a few options as far as how they can approach hunting a monster. There are a couple weapons that are retarded but the majority of the sandbox is balanced as far as effectiveness with some being better for some monsters. The environments also have natural traps and you can somewhat lead monsters into positions to make them easier. Also, there are shit like turf wars where another monster will interrupt the fight. The game is kind of clunky and ugly but it is enjoyable. The level design is quite interesting as well. I don't mind concept of cooldowns as controllers but like you said the ability should not be balanced by the cooldown. Overwatch suffers from a major identity crisis. You think they would have been smarter and stuck more to what made TF2 great and tried to correct the issues the game had but they made the issues worse with more hard chokes(TF2 has more soft chokes which makes it so a team doesn't have to bottle up at it and deathball or try to jump right passed it and possible get counter dived), more shit going off on the screen and added cooldowns. Even the way Blizzard has chosen to balance things is not very good. Rather than adding nuances to an ability that is very powerful they just change damage, speed, and cooldown time which typically causes more harm to the games balance. Causing heroes that weren't powerful before to be seen as menaces. The example I use typically is the first McCree fth nerf. Because the issue wasn't it's strength in my opinion it was the roll reload and the range of it. It was too effective at too great a range. If it only worked at point blank range similar to the mauler in H3 it would have been okay. Also, this nerf has been pretty much completely reverted now because of GOATS. Which just tells me Blizzard has no idea what they want this game to be and just react to the noisiest complainers. Which is not working as well because they can't seem to alter something enough to counter GOATS. Overwatch pisses me off and makes me rant. Id like to try it but I heard it's suuuuuper grindy :/
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Post by purelyfat on Jan 29, 2019 16:52:18 GMT
You guys should check out Monster Hunter World. It has some issues but the game gives the player quite a few options as far as how they can approach hunting a monster. There are a couple weapons that are retarded but the majority of the sandbox is balanced as far as effectiveness with some being better for some monsters. The environments also have natural traps and you can somewhat lead monsters into positions to make them easier. Also, there are shit like turf wars where another monster will interrupt the fight. The game is kind of clunky and ugly but it is enjoyable. The level design is quite interesting as well. I don't mind concept of cooldowns as controllers but like you said the ability should not be balanced by the cooldown. Overwatch suffers from a major identity crisis. You think they would have been smarter and stuck more to what made TF2 great and tried to correct the issues the game had but they made the issues worse with more hard chokes(TF2 has more soft chokes which makes it so a team doesn't have to bottle up at it and deathball or try to jump right passed it and possible get counter dived), more shit going off on the screen and added cooldowns. Even the way Blizzard has chosen to balance things is not very good. Rather than adding nuances to an ability that is very powerful they just change damage, speed, and cooldown time which typically causes more harm to the games balance. Causing heroes that weren't powerful before to be seen as menaces. The example I use typically is the first McCree fth nerf. Because the issue wasn't it's strength in my opinion it was the roll reload and the range of it. It was too effective at too great a range. If it only worked at point blank range similar to the mauler in H3 it would have been okay. Also, this nerf has been pretty much completely reverted now because of GOATS. Which just tells me Blizzard has no idea what they want this game to be and just react to the noisiest complainers. Which is not working as well because they can't seem to alter something enough to counter GOATS. Overwatch pisses me off and makes me rant. Id like to try it but I heard it's suuuuuper grindy :/ It really is, but if you have a group to play with it goes much smoother. When I play by myself I will probably spend most of the session on one hunt but when I play with my crew I just run through shit even though the difficulty goes up. This might be partially caused by me having an insect glaive build which is aerial oriented which isn't the best for some monsters but is absolutely fantastic for others, flying shit.
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Post by westin on Jan 29, 2019 22:48:47 GMT
I've updated this thread a few times if anyone is interested in skimming back over.
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Post by icyhotspartin on Feb 4, 2019 6:19:54 GMT
westin, you mind if I quote you in an upcoming article?
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Post by icyhotspartin on Feb 4, 2019 7:33:36 GMT
You meant "extracurricular" activity, right? I find your typo to be rather on the nose, however. Virtue is a circular activity - any skill requires the constant building strengthening of itself, coming back around after every successful completion of the relevant activity // also soon to be featured in a more in-depth analysis ;)
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