HONEST CHALLENGE, AND POSITIVE REINFORCEMENT

Posts

author=Max McGee link=topic=3052.msg59786#msg59786 date=1233430889
What you're saying is, in other words, make candy-ass games where it's impossible to die because you're too much of a pussy to kill the player due to fear that they'll stop playing. This kind of wussified game design philosophy just makes me ANGRY.

Thank you, Max.
<< Opinion shown by name of company.


Actually, we usually use the following difficulty levels, with rewards adjusted/separate high scores/etc. as needed.

| Easy | Normal | Hard | Holy Crap This Is Impossible |


I believe in having some choice of difficulty to adjust to the player's needs, but I do not believe and would never make a game like this:
author=Max McGee link=topic=3052.msg59786#msg59786 date=1233430889
What you're saying is, in other words, make candy-ass games where it's impossible to die because you're too much of a pussy to kill the player due to fear that they'll stop playing.
So to those of you who have a problem with providing an easy game for those of your players who might not be up to the challenges you offer, let me pose this question:

Why?
harmonic
It's like toothpicks against a tank
4142
Holy shit, I agree wholeheartedly with Max's statement.

Wussy game design is a big race to see how immediate, unsatisfying, and spoon-fed your challenges can get in order to cater to the lowest common denominator of wussy gamer.

The games make the gamer, really.
author=Shadowtext link=topic=3052.msg60075#msg60075 date=1233555730
So to those of you who have a problem with providing an easy game for those of your players who might not be up to the challenges you offer, let me pose this question:

Why?

Everyone has their own agenda. Not everyone wants to play a game with no challenge either.

Just accept that.

FTR, I have quit easy games before.
author=Karsuman link=topic=3052.msg60077#msg60077 date=1233556000
author=Shadowtext link=topic=3052.msg60075#msg60075 date=1233555730
So to those of you who have a problem with providing an easy game for those of your players who might not be up to the challenges you offer, let me pose this question:

Why?

Everyone has their own agenda. Not everyone wants to play a game with no challenge either.

Just accept that.
Geez, If I had known "why" was such a controversial question, I would've tried to figure out a less offensive way to ask it.
author=Shadowtext link=topic=3052.msg60078#msg60078 date=1233559217
author=Karsuman link=topic=3052.msg60077#msg60077 date=1233556000
author=Shadowtext link=topic=3052.msg60075#msg60075 date=1233555730
So to those of you who have a problem with providing an easy game for those of your players who might not be up to the challenges you offer, let me pose this question:

Why?

Everyone has their own agenda. Not everyone wants to play a game with no challenge either.

Just accept that.
Geez, If I had known "why" was such a controversial question, I would've tried to figure out a less offensive way to ask it.

When did I say it was controversial?

All I said was that not everyone wants to play Barney the Purple Dinosaur.

To be honest, I don't have much patience for this topic because I think the notion of reducing difficulty for the sake of getting a few more 13-year olds to play our games in this community is ridiculous. If there is no penalty for failure, why worry about failing in the first place? Could play as horribly as you want and still win.

That strikes me as incredibly dull, and uninspired game design at its worst. There is a difference between balanced gameplay and stupidly easy gameplay.

Also, SHORTEN YOUR POSTS. Especially when your point can be condensed into a paragraph. No one wants to read a novel-length post.
So to those of you who have a problem with providing an easy game for those of your players who might not be up to the challenges you offer, let me pose this question:

Why?

First, because the gameplay design its also ART for me, and i don't want to make a total stupid game. I will put an easy mode, but at least will have like FFVI challengue. I will also quit a lot of options of this mode, and put clearly that its only for newbies.

I don't want that everyone see the ending of my game.
Shadowtext's huge post was exactly what I needed to see

especially the part where he talked about creators telling people that the game gets better beyond *insert stupidly tedious/hard section here* since I am one of those creators turns out

I guess I was in denial that the intro was broken, the players who I am in closest contact with never reported problems because I told them the exact strategy to beat that section, people who use the exact correct startegy have no problem but if people find it too time consuming or don't do it the exact right way, they get stuck and give up on it and there really isn't much excuse for having that in the game's first section. I had loads of problems I wasn't being honest about and that made that part of the game harder then it probably should be. If half of my audience are complaining about the difficulty of that section then I ought to start being honest with myself about it. Now I can fix it without regret or feeling like I'm giving in to lazy people, because these people are not lazy, they just know a needlessly punishing obstacle when they see it

I think everyone who gets complaints about a boss or section should take an honest look at it. They should ask themselves if it is more important to them that the section remains this challenging or that more people are able to experience the game beyond it. Is it merely challenging or is there a flaw in the game's balance that you are in denial about? Is it appropraite for this section or boss to be challenging? (as in are these early sections and early bosses) The most important question is "is it fun?" if the fights are boring then reduce the HP of the enemies to make them shorter, if the challenge forces the players to do tedious things then the game is broken and needs to be fixed. As has been said, the players are doing you a favor by playing your game, they should enjoy the experience.

It is difficult for people to tone down enemies if they feel that thier game requires "startegy" but somthing for all us start happy creators to keep in mind is that if the player plays the game the way we intended, using the correct startegy, it should make the game's challenges easier for him, not possible. If somthing is impossible to overcome unless the player follows the exact right strategy, then the game is broken. Fixing the difficulty in this case is not making the game "Barney's Fun Time Adventure" its making the game balanced

there is too easy but there is also needlessly hard, both break games and it is up to the creators to be honest about if there game is really somewhere in between or not. If half of your audience is stuck, that is too many. You want the player to beat the game because you want the player to experience everything you created for him, or at least that is the way we ought to think
harmonic
It's like toothpicks against a tank
4142
Failure is essential to video games as it is essential to life. Failure is the reason we strive to better ourselves. We try to avoid it, but it is inevitable, and we adapt by learning from it.

A lot of gamers don't know what they want but will still spout off what they think.

That said, the opposite end of the spectrum is plain old bad game design. Take battletoads for the NES as a great example of a game that the developers did not TEST before shipping, because only a cyborg alien mutant god can beat it without cheating, or using an emulator and 5 trillion save/load states.
I agree with the essential post Shadowtext has written here. A good game should have some degree of challenge, even if the challenge comes from beating one's own record. A great example of that is the game 'Super Rub-a-Dub-' that one can download from the Playstation Store. Essentially, it is a puzzle game where one navigates rubber ducks to a drain. The game's challenge comes in two folds, getting enough little duckies into the drain to award you a bronze, silver, or gold medal, and then beating your own best time in subsequent plays.

In RPGs, the line is a bit less blurred, but challenge should still be fair enough as to provide the player with both the impetus to succeed and the consequence should he not succeed. Failure does not have to be long-lasting (or permanent), nor does it have to be detrimental to the game's outcome. Often times, just having to repeat the event is enough. For example, in Ubisoft's Assassin's Creed, every event, save for the actual assassinations, are replayable in case of failure without the game restoring from the previous save. This gives the player effectively unlimited chances to succeed, with the greatest failure being frustration at an individual event, as opposed to the frustration of losing hours of gameplay.

Failure and losing is a part of life. Harmonic actually put it perfectly, but I'm going to paraphrase with my own example and experience inserted. Not everyone likes the stories I write or the games I create, and some are very vocal to express it. However, from the failures I have, I learn from them and move on. Much like in a video game, when you fail at a certain quest or activity, you learn from your mistake and incorporate that into your next play-through. So whether a game designer or a game player, failure is a necessary and often rewarding experience.

And now to address Shadowtext's controversial question:

So to those of you who have a problem with providing an easy game for those of your players who might not be up to the challenges you offer, let me pose this question:

Why?

A lot of times, Shadowtext, a lone Game Designer will make a game all by himself, with maybe one person making maps or graphics. And as that person plays through their own game, testing for bugs and getting it ready for release, they already know the way to solve the puzzles, get the treasures, and beat the bosses. Therefore, since they are playing the game with developer's knowledge, they are unable to see the true difficultly. Therefore, as Yoshio pointed out, when a game's boss is very difficult, the developer ends up giving strategies to those who contact him directly, not counting the hundreds, or even thousands of people who don't have the benefit of the Designer's email address. Therefore, their experience of the game is much harder.

That's why it's vital to have a beta-tester who is not on the design team, one who is completely unaware of the code, tips, cheats, etc. That beta-tester plays through the game, not only looking for bugs, but reporting frustration spots, or places that he or she just cannot complete. The Game Designer then must be willing to listen to the beta-tester explaining the difficulty of the game without resorting to defensiveness or explaining the solution. Only then can the game become something truly good.
I'm really surprised by the amount of fight this is getting. "I don't want everybody to be able to see the end of my game?" Seriously? Why does getting to the end of the game have to be the ultimate reward for the hardcore gamer? Is there really no reward during gameplay that is satisfying to a masochistic gamer until they reach that "Game Over" screen at the end?

Either people are missing the point of the argument, or everyone claims to be a hardcore gamer (not that it's hard to imaging, we are a community of gamers after all). Shadowtext isn't necessarily saying we should make games easier, but that's what the concensus seems to be. Let's focus the discussion a little bit. Punishment, reward, and game difficulty don't have to be so black and white. Here's some gray area factors we can discuss:

1) What type of game is in question? If you're making a Mega Man platformer or the like, then I could easily see why you don't want people reaching the end without a lot of blood, sweat, and tears. The satisfaction for overcoming the challenges IS the ending and that lovely "Game Over" screen. But an RPG? Do you value the story you've written for the game? Is it the right thing to do leave the best parts only to the hardest working players? Hardcore gamers only exist if the gameplay presents the right amount of challenge and bragging rights when a challenge is overcome. Min-maxers in MMO's and low-level runners in RPG's spend the extra time and effort for ARTIFICIAL challenge because of the gameplay, not because of the story. If some casual gamer just happens to enjoy your story, should they be required to exert all the blood, sweat, and tears to get to that ending?

2) Based on the game in question, what is the difficulty threshold? People may or may not necessarily stop playing a game if it's considered too easy or too hard. However, very few are likely to continue playing a game if it's STUPIDLY easy or STUPIDLY hard. Punishment for failing isn't necessarily stupidly hard, but the question is, where is the line drawn between the two? It's different for every game. Contra as an example. You have X lives to complete the game. If you lose them all, it's Game Over, and you're back at the beginning. This is accepted because the core gameplay element is progressive difficulty (i.e., you don't gain levels or get stronger in any way, you just grab whatever powerups you can). In an RPG, the player has more control over the difficulty by deciding whether or not to level grind before proceeding. Putting a system in place to limit this is perfectly fine. What I consider stupidly difficult, however, is when the first dungeon or set of non-boss battles nearly or succeed with wiping out your party. No, this is not a challenge, it's bad game design.

Like mentioned above, difficulty balancing is an art, and a critical factor in game design. Dismissively choosing to make your game easy or hard might be your intention, but so much more than that decides whether or not it's implemented properly. I believe the point of the topic was to acknowledge and differentiate punishing difficulty from rewarded effort. Do you all really believe that rewarding effort is such a bad thing? The game doesn't have to be easy. But if a player keeps trying, and trying, and trying to get past a difficult part in your game, are they really going to improve and pass it? Will they find the right strategy and defeat it? Or will they just perhaps catch a break one time when the boss misses a few time and doesn't critically hit as much? Consider that, and decide what you guys think is good design and what isn't.
author=harmonic link=topic=3052.msg60097#msg60097 date=1233593456
Failure is essential to video games as it is essential to life. Failure is the reason we strive to better ourselves. We try to avoid it, but it is inevitable, and we adapt by learning from it.

A lot of gamers don't know what they want but will still spout off what they think.

That said, the opposite end of the spectrum is plain old bad game design. Take battletoads for the NES as a great example of a game that the developers did not TEST before shipping, because only a cyborg alien mutant god can beat it without cheating, or using an emulator and 5 trillion save/load states.

Failure is an anticipated result from, let's say, ALMOST all video games (99.9% etc, etc, basically excluding some outcasts). Games are designed with events that respond specifically to failure (like a Game Over screen). The design question I present is, is your game (by which I mean anyone who reads this) designed in such a way that failure presents an opportunity to learn from your mistakes? IS there a strategy to overcome? Or IS the strategy to use restorative items and abilities liberally until the enemy's HP is widdled down? I'd argue, generally speaking, that the latter is poor game design.

I'd also argue that making a game too easy is NOT automatically bad game design. In the new Prince of Persia, you cannot die, and you do not return to any sort of "restore" points. This, obviously, makes the game incredibly easy. Is it designed poorly? I don't know, I played it all the way through. Why? The gameplay is fun without the fear of failure. Frustration does exist; whenever you have to be "saved," the boss you're fighting will regenerate health. In fact, you are not let go from a boss fight until you beat them, which can take just a little time, or quite a bit of time. If you are able to die and have to reload from a save point to work your way back to the boss to try again, will you have gained better knowledge from your failures than if you were face to face with the boss the whole time?

Here's another topic for discussion: what satisfaction to you get from overcoming a challenge you've been failing at? Is it proportional to the time AND/OR effort you expended to overcome it? Does it require, or would it be enhanced by a material reward?
In the new Prince of Persia, you cannot die, and you do not return to any sort of "restore" points. This, obviously, makes the game incredibly easy.

And that is why I fucking hated it.
author=Feldschlacht IV link=topic=3052.msg60157#msg60157 date=1233610783
In the new Prince of Persia, you cannot die, and you do not return to any sort of "restore" points. This, obviously, makes the game incredibly easy.

And that is why I fucking hated it.

And that's completely fair. I still think the game was designed well, and accomplished what it set out to.
Well technically you do die, but you skip the GAME OVER, the PRESS START, the resume save file, the select file and running back to where you were. But then again it's pretty insane to consider wanting to be constantly in the action instead of going through menus and shit you already seen before!
You forgot those incredibly awful GLORYously epick cutscenes!
I quit! Everyone makes novel long posts until just recently!
Max McGee
with sorrow down past the fence
9159
author=Neophyte link=topic=3052.msg59803#msg59803 date=1233434231
It's perfectly fine to die because of something challenging Max, but it's not okay if you die and have the punishment of going through a long cutscene again or fighting the 3 mini bosses before you get to the real boss again. If this scenario happened in Starless Umbra, would that somehow make the game more fun because you died and had to redo pointless things?

The player has already passed that scene or those other bosses, why make them go through it again? They already proved that they were capable of handling everything until that last battle (which can still be challenging, that's okay). I don't think anybody wants to play a game that is really really easy since most of us here are pretty skilled, but there are a lot of things that just don't seem necessary when trying to add difficulty.

The game Anaryu mentioned reminds me of Spelunky. It's a VERY hard game and it actually punishes you by taking you back to the first level of the game if you die. But it is so easy to get back into the game since it literally takes 3 seconds to select your level and try again. The challenge of the game also comes from most of the players actions, most accidents that happen in the game are really the players fault.

No matter how good your game is, if you can't let the player get right back to the action of where they were, they WILL shut it off because of the frustration. This is almost guaranteed.

I think you're missing the point. I never died in Starless Umbra AT ALL and that is why I quit. I'm not advocating for punishing the player for dying; save points should be plentiful, and located AFTER long cutscenes. But it should be at least POSSIBLE to die.