Week 17: The Search for Week 16 - Game Design Notes 1; Loving What You Come To Hate (Which you used to love)

So I totally missed last week. No great excuses other than being busy, which isn't a great reason to have skipped posting even a quick update. For my atonement, I'll actually start my series of Game Design Notes, in which I will talk about various lessons I've learned in the hope that someone benefits from my past experiences. This week, I'm going to talk about one of the first things that I ever noticed about myself after getting into game design, and how I went about fixing it.

Game designers play lots of games. Well, they should play lots of games. If you aren't interested in playing games, I'd question why you're interested in making them. There are too many lessons to learn from what others have done and are doing. Yes, a turn-based strategy game can certainly speak to something that you're doing in your first person shooter, you just have to know where to look. This is a skill that develops over time, and is very important. This, however, isn't what I'm here to talk about today. Today, I want to talk about a phenomenon that I know I experienced, and in speaking to numerous other designers, isn't limited to just myself. It has nothing to do with working with engine tools, developing systems, or playing games for research. It, instead, has everything to do with playing games for fun.

When you become a game designer, you have to develop a critical eye so that you can ingest everything media related that you consume. Asking how a wrestling gimmick might be applicable to your game is a real thing. Understanding the economy in a city building simulation can potentially help your realty system in your open world game. You begin to peel back the curtain, as it were, and this is two-fold when it comes to games; since they are what you work on. This has the very real effect of liking games less, especially early on in a game designers career.

After I got into the industry, I went through a period of about a year in which I could not really enjoy playing anything. I'd find every fault I could, not just bugs, but flawed systems or poorly designed levels, and blinded myself to anything good that was there. The critical reception didn't matter. For instance, Oblivion came out during this period of my life, and while I put many hours into that game then I really didn't have fun playing it. Sure, I learned a lot by being this critical, but I got into game design because I loved games, and suddenly what I'd made a career of was making me hate them. I had to take a step back and see what had gone wrong. I realized the following things, and they're tips I now give to any designers I talk to that have mentioned having the same problem.

1. Being critical is OK. It's necessary. Knowing how something could be made better is part of what makes a designer a designer.
2. Just because something could be better doesn't always mean it's bad. It just means there is room for improvement, be it in an update or a sequel. There are certainly times when something is bad, but figure out if its absolutely game-breaking versus something that would just make the experience more enjoyable.
3. Try to understand why something you perceive as bad is bad. What was the developers reasoning? Is there another system that the one you perceive as bad is interacting with, and the way it works is actually vital to the other or both?
4. Make sure that something you perceive is bad isn't just something that you don't like. There is a big difference between something being flawed and something you just don't enjoy. This is arguably the most important of the tips.

These have helped me remain critical while enjoying games that I am wanting to play mostly for fun over just research. As a game designer, I cannot just play for fun...I am always going to be analyzing. I just have to remember to have fun at the same time.

Started playing Star Wars The Old Republic again this weekend. I'd forgotten how much I really liked the game, and they've done a lot with it since going Free 2 Play. Still playing all the other games listed in currently playing, too. Really enjoying HotS a lot, and Bloodborne now has improved load times, which help playing that immensely. Until next week!

Currently Playing: Pillars of Eternity, Final Fantasy XIV, Bloodborne, Star Wars The Old Republic, Heroes of the Storm
Games Completed: 4 (The Longest Journey, Final Fantasy XIII-2, Hyrule Warriors, Ori and the Blind Forest)
Games Purchased (SP/Narrative): 4 (Majora's Mask, Ori and the Blind Forest, Final Fantasy Type-0 HD, Bloodborne)
Other Games Purchased: GRAV, Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate
Net Total: 0

Week 15: In Search Of Atma Zodiac

So this week was pretty busy in the evenings with both work and band practice and hanging out with friends, and as such, I didn't play anywhere near as much Pillars of Eternity as I'd imagined I would when the week began. Hell, I left my laptop at the office two nights. Instead, when I had the chance to play, I mostly played Final Fantasy XIV. 

I'd been working on upgrading my Relic Weapon, which involves a bit of grinding of various different things. For the part I just wrapped up, you run around to various FATEs (timed events) in an area and do them until a certain item drops. You have to do this in 12 different zones, so it's time consuming, but something I was able to sneak in and do a zone or two in the times I did play. Yes, it's grindy, but I'm a player type that enjoys grinding (see my hours in any Diablo or Diablo-like game as proof) so it wasn't a big deal. I finally completed it Friday. I did get some Pillars of Eternity in over the weekend, as well as a little Bloodborne and Marvel Heroes 2015. I also really started digging into Heroes of the Storm, which I am greatly enjoying. I'll talk more about that next week after I've had more time with it, but I'm pretty sure I find it a much more interesting game that League of Legends for a number of reasons. I'm sure that will be an unpopular opinion with my LoL diehard friends.

Heroclix was a success with the daughter. We did a few rounds of the basic game (i.e. not using powers) and we're going to move into doing that during the week. She's pretty excited about building a team, and equally excited about the Deadpool booster packs we have coming in. I managed to get out of International Tabletop Day only ordering a single game, which was Rivet Wars for what ended up being 60% off. I know CMON had some issues with getting the game out, but I've only heard good things about the game itself. Plus it has cool steampunk-esque minis. I also kept myself from immediately ordering the expansions, which is pretty crazy for me.

Currently Playing: Pillars of Eternity, Final Fantasy XIV, Bloodborne, Marvel Heroes 2015, Heroes of the Storm
Games Completed: 4 (The Longest Journey, Final Fantasy XIII-2, Hyrule Warriors, Ori and the Blind Forest)
Games Purchased (SP/Narrative): 3 (Majora's Mask, Ori and the Blind Forest, Final Fantasy Type-0 HD, Bloodborne)
Other Games Purchased: GRAV, Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate
Net Total: 0

Week 14: Pillars of Eternity

So I received my new laptop, and it's really nice. Pretty much replaced my home PC at this point, with no loss of quality in games. I'll need an external hard drive, but for now I'm good. True to my word, the first game I played on the system was Pillars of Eternity. Boy, what a game the guys over at Obsidian made.

Pillars of Eternity is well-known for being one of the most funded video game Kickstarter projects, with the goal being to make an RPG that was reminiscent of the older Black Isle Infinity Engine games, such as Baldur's Gate, Icewind Dale, and Planescape: Torment. I'm here to tell you that they greatly succeeded at their goal. It's a product of the past brought forward in time, designed with knowledge of present design sensibilities. In many ways, its a refinement of those titles I listed previously. I always felt that the combat in IWD was better than BG, simply because it was less slavish to 2nd Ed. D&D than BG was. Being completely free from a system designed to be used in a tabletop experience for PoE makes it even better.

I know some people hate Real-time with Pause. I know some people picked a class they didn't like and thus they didn't have a good initial experience. Whatever. PoE has been consuming almost all my free time. Hell, I was even playing it while waiting for certain things to pop in FFXIV. I'm ~10 hours in playtime in, and I haven't even gone to the first of two major cities yet. The game seems enormous. I'm very early in the main plot thread, too, and have mainly been doing side quests. I love, love, love this game.

I've played a little Marvel Heroes 2015 in the past few days, as I had the itch for something mindless. Also did some more FFXIV and finally upgraded my chest armor on my healer. Yay? As for Bloodborne, it's still being played. I even did a Share Play for @Chupacaubrey to get her to the first boss so that we could eventually co-op.

In non-digital gaming news, I picked up the Age of Ultron Heroclix starter, as my daughter requested that we play, "that super heroes miniatures game again." Needless to say, I'll always oblige when asked something like that.

Currently Playing: Pillars of Eternity, Final Fantasy XIV, Bloodborne, Marvel Heroes 2015
Games Completed: 4 (The Longest Journey, Final Fantasy XIII-2, Hyrule Warriors, Ori and the Blind Forest)
Games Purchased (SP/Narrative): 3 (Majora's Mask, Ori and the Blind Forest, Final Fantasy Type-0 HD, Bloodborne)
Other Games Purchased: GRAV, Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate
Net Total: 0