Recently I had an interesting insight, but I need some background to explain it.
First, let’s think about games. Single player games, for now. One of the definitions of games given in Rules of Play is that game players deal with unnecessary obstacles. Imagine Super Mario Bros., for example; there are all sorts of obstacles in the path to the Princess at the end. In a sense, there is no reason why these obstacles are there; one could easily imagine a version of SMB that lets you just walk a flat, enemy-less path to the end. But the obstacles make it a game. (I highly recommend reading the book, because it’s much better written than my fumbling summary.)
So, SMB contains obstacles. We can think of these obstacles as skill tests. If you fail at a skill test–that is, if you miss a jump or can’t dodge an enemy–you are sent back to your most recent checkpoint. You have a certain number of chances, and if you use up all yoru chances, the game is over. So, SMB is focused on skill tests.
Now let’s think about another game, Knights of the Old Republic. If you haven’t played KotOR, it’s the type of computer game called an “RPG”, set in the Star Wars continuity. (”RPG” in this case is kind of a misnomer, but I’m not going to address that in this post.) KotOR is a fun game and I highly recommend it. If you’ve ever played any of the “main” Final Fantasy games, as well as Dragon Warrior/Dragon Quest, Atelier Iris or any of a thousand other RPGs…then you know the basic flow of the game. But let’s go over it to refresh our memories…
Knights of the Old Republic also has obstacles and skill tests, but its structure is slightly more complex. During most of the game you have the option to explore various areas at whatever pace you wish, and while there is always someplace to go (often many places), the game doesn’t force you along as much as SMB’s screen that only scrolls to the right. In KotOR you can take time to explore areas and increase the power of your party. This is important because the skill tests in KotOR are dependent on how powerful your party is, and to a lesser extent your strategy; you really need to spend time increasing the in-game power of your characters. Practicing–that is, developing your own skills–won’t get you far. Of course, this in-game power-up process isn’t too onerous, because mere exploration and moving from place to place will provide some of it. The game is pretty well “balanced” in that respect.
Let me take a moment to explain that last statement. “Balanced” is a term that can have several meanings. In the context of single-player games, like I’m using it, it usually means “not too difficult and not too easy”. In other words, the game provides you with a challenge that’s appropriate to your skill level; it’s fun. As I’ve said, most of the “skill” tests in KotOR deal with your characters’ in-game power, but the game includes a lot of exploration and questing that will increase that power. In other words, things that you were already expecting to do–exploration and questing–increase your in-game power enough to pass the “power tests”. Therefore, it doesn’t seem like you have to do anything “special” to pass these tests.
My point is that there are things people expect to do in games and things they don’t really want to do. Playing an RPG like KotOR, people expect to spend time exploring vast areas, fighting monsters along the way, solving problems for NPCs…those are things that players usually think are fun. However, in some games you can reach a point where your characters are just not powerful enough to pass the power test; in this case you have to do something to increase your characters’ in-game power. You have to take time out from the fun stuff you were doing and, say, go kill monsters for a while. Often this is referred to as “grinding”, a word that wonderfully evokes the mindless, fun-less nature of the task. RPG players aren’t exactly surprised when they have to do this, but the more grinding is necessary, the less balanced the game seems to be.
(I realize that I’m making sweeping generalizations about what players find “fun”. Different players find different sorts of fun in games–that’s something that’s been hammered into me over the years, no question. But it’s all in service to my points!)
So, the point is–Ideally, when players play games, they don’t have to spend any time on tasks that aren’t fun. Assuming players enjoy exploring and questing more than they do wandering around finding monsters to kill–a truly “balanced” game shouldn’t require any monster-kill grinding. Sure, without obstacles it wouldn’t be a game, but what we’re looking for is that line that separates “obstacles the player enjoys overcoming” and “tasks the player feels forced to accomplish in order to get back to the fun”. That, to me, is what every game designer searches for (even if they don’t consciously realize they’re doing so).
Okay, that’s cool. But let’s back up a bit. Let’s think about KotOR again and its “power tests”. When I talk about these tests, I’m usually thinking of bosses. These are in-game characters or creatures that the player must defeat in battle to advance to the next stage of the game. The player’s in-game power must be powerful enough to defeat the boss; therefore, to reduce the boss to its most simple form, it’s a test of the player’s in-game power.
So what happens when you go through this test? There are usually two options:
- Pass the test–Go on to the next stage of the game.
- Fail the test–Game over. Start over from your last saved game or some other checkpoint.
But wait–This reminds me of something. It reminds me of a post or article over on The Forge, although I wasn’t able to find the specific reference. I bet it was something posted by Ron Edwards; I’ll try to recreate the argument as best I can.
Now we’re moving away from computer games and talking about pen-and-paper roleplaying games–Dungeons & Dragons being the most famous example. For those not aware, Ron Edwards has spent a lot of time thinking and writing about RPGs, coming up with new models for what they actually include. Of course there’s debate, but here’s one basic point that he (and many other people) agree on: A lot of published RPG rule systems do the same basic stuff because “that’s how everyone does it”, but there are other ways to do things that are worth exploring. Hence, a site about “indie” RPGs, where people who are interested in non-mainstream stuff (or, to put it another way, bored with mainstream stuff) congregate.
Here’s one example of a different way to do things in RPGs. Let’s imagine there’s a character with a “Pick Locks” skill. They sneak into an enemy compound in order to steal some documents. They come upon a door they need to get through to advance further; the door is locked. So, they do a power test–they roll some dice and look at their Pick Locks skill.
Let’s say they fail the roll.
So…Now what? The character is stuck. They can’t advance until they succeed at their roll. Just like KotOR–back to the last saved game.
Now, in a real RPG session you usually have a GM who is there to improvise in some way. One simple way to deal with this problem is to let the character break down the door–but this might attract the attention of guards, making the character’s situation stickier.
Some RPG systems tackle this problem by developing the notion of “stakes” more. In the original scenario, the stakes were simple:
- If you win this test, the door is open and you can advance.
- If you lose, you cannot advance.
But there are other ways to do this. Let’s imagine the stakes of the conflict were set as follows:
- If you win this test, the door is open and you can advance.
- If you lose, you get the door open, but you make so much noise that guards are attracted.
In a sense, all we’ve done is fold some improvisation into the conflict. (RPG theorists often refer to these “tests” as “conflicts”.) We’ve made more explicit the idea that this test doesn’t put a halt to the game; instead, failure puts more pressure on the character and makes the story more interesting. The focus is not as much on the mechanics of the in-game power; the focus is more on how the story will develop and what (hopefully interesting) things will happen to the character next.
So, going back to KotOR’s power tests, now they look a bit limiting. Basically a KotOR boss can be summarized as follows:
- If you win, you advance.
- If you lose, reload your save and grind until you think you can try again.
So, do we have to do it like this? We can take a page from the indie RPGs and create different stakes than something “win/retry”. But now we’re getting into a branching storyline and exponential growth of content. In other words, if you want a “lose” option, you have to write and develop it; that could be hard.
Perhaps there are ways to more easily develop branching and adaptive storylines. But that’s a post for another day…