Geimzain (Designing games. A guide to engineering experiences) - Part IV
This post continues the review of the book, which has already had two posts: 1, 2 and 3. We will continue to talk about the second part of the book.The art of making a game"
Head. 6. Balance The author begins by defining
Balance means adjusting game mechanics to change the relative power of various instruments, combat units, strategy, teams or characters. Balance is a tool used for different purposes, where two things stand out: honesty and depth. The game is considered fair if at first neither player has an advantage. In order for the game to be deep, it must generate solutions that are so balanced that even an expert would have difficulty making decisions. Usually, players use specific strategies - specific sets of actions to achieve goals. And if there is no degenerate strategy (Obviously the best for this situation.), then the game is deep. Interestingly, the balance depends on the skill of the player, as different skill levels give access to different strategies.
Sometimes for the sake of balance, the game designer decides to change one of the mechanics that make up the game. But the change in mechanics is changing all the strategies it's built into, not just the ones we planned to change. Finding balance is difficult enough. Just like when making architectural decisions:)
Head. 7. A multiplayer game The author begins this chapter by considering the theory of games, to which individual books are devoted.Game theory", "Comic Book Game Theory" It's about Nash equilibrium, mixed strategies, yomi. (Reading your opponent’s mind and trying to convince them that you’ll do one thing and you’ll actually do something else.). In multiplayer games, players can often have different goals, which leads to the fact that some players disrupt the experience of other players.
Head. 8. Motivation and satisfaction This chapter begins with a reference to dopamine pleasure and the anticipation of a reward that works better than receiving a reward. Next articleThe author talks about the reinforcement regime
Reinforcement is a system of rules that determines when a reward is given. Most reinforcement modes have an implicit development scheme when they emerge from lower-level gaming systems. This is called emergent reinforcement modes. Intriguingly, reinforcement modes working through external motivation and rewards can displace and destroy the game’s internal content and motivation. Therefore The goal of awards design is to create a system that can detect and reward the player accordingly for whatever they already want to do. Because each game is unique, it needs its own system.
Head. 9. Interface. The author begins by saying that we 2 goal
- to convey information about what will happen in the game - here we need to develop systems that structure and organize information
- to enable governance - here we must develop a complex combination of constraints, agreements and support systems To do this, metaphors are often used that give new information familiar features to make it easier to understand. What’s more, the game must set a metaphor dictionary that specifies which elements model mechanics, and match that dictionary. For information to be perceived better, a visual hierarchy is used, in which important elements become more prominent than unimportant ones.
Head. 10. Market This chapter focuses on how games feel in the marketplace. About the Matthew effect, the innovator's dilemma, market segmentation, the value curve. In general, here we enter the territory of marketing and sales planning:)
P.S. This is the end of the book, so the "Processes" part of the book is very well intersected with the usual development processes that I talk about so often.
#Design #GameDesign #SystemDesign #SystemThinking #Management #SelfDevelopment