Consequences in Gamebooks

A few weeks ago I started a post about death in gamebooks, and wound up writing a post about death in games. The basic conclusion I reached is that death is fun if it's part of the learning experience, moving the player one step closer to mastery, but not fun if it's just tedious.

But what I meant to talk about what what some of the other alternatives are to death. Risk of failure is an important part of any game, and consequences are an important part of failure. Death is only one possible consequence.

This week, let's look at what a few other types of consequences might be:

Loss of Items: A tried and true method of consequence, you can always dock stuff from the player. Players hate losing things, so use this method with some caution. Items, especially unique items, are a certain measure of progress for players, so taking their shit away can feel even more devastating than a death--especially if it's permanent.

Lose Everything: Even more devastating is to completely strip everything from the player. This can be a great story technique as it introduces challenge and struggle, and at the end of the day, the player can feel even more heroic when they get all their cool shit back, knowing they don't actually need it to succeed. As long as they get their cool shit back sooner or later.

Lose a Companion: This is a technique I used in Peledgathol: The Last Fortress (pronounced Peh-led-gat-hole btw; no blurring of consonants). Early on you are introduced to Ghuzdim Halfjaw, a stalwart dwarf warrior who swears to protect you, the young king, with his life. He is quite earnest, and will, in fact, protect you with his life. The first time you die in combat over the course of the story, if Ghuzdim is with you, you instead get re-directed to a section in which Ghuzdim leaps in at the last moment and takes the blow for you. He dies of course, and he isn't there to protect you next time, but it gives you one "get out of jail free" card over the course of the story, while still making the failure seem meaningful.

Fall to a Different Story Thread: This is one that I'm using in the project I'm working on now. There's one whole part of the book in which, if at any time you fail too severely, instead of dying, you get captured as a slave and must fight your way free. It's a different story thread, and it permanently bars you from succeeding at your original goals for the chapter, as such, but it also opens up some new opportunities that you might never have had otherwise, such as a new companion who you can meet in the Arenas. Also, it's cool. (I actually use this technique several times in said upcoming project...)

Future Consequences: Maybe the consequences of a player's actions won't kick in right away. Maybe you won't know until later on what really came of the decisions, or failures, that you just went through. I'm using this in my current project as well; in my case, if you fail at sneaking into a certain location and get caught, you won't get killed, but word gets around that you were doing something sneaky. Later on, you will find certain doors closed to you. This is an extremely open ended option that packs a double whammy: not only does it suffice as an alternate method of doling out consequences, but it also gives the world a sense of breathing realism. What you do has an effect, and you'll see that effect for time to come. That can be a very rewarding game experience.

Lose Points: Rather prosaic, but surprisingly effective, if your story has some measure of tracking progress (dollars, units of time, number of zombies killed/acquired) you can clearly signal success or failure to the player by manipulating the point numbers. Everybody likes their numbers to be better.

In some ways, I might even argue that a non-death consequence is more meaningful than a death scene, because in most games, what "death" actually translates to is, "try again."

What do you guys think? What have I missed?

Failure and Death in Gamebooks

Something I've been thinking about a lot lately is how to impose consequences for failure in gamebooks. The traditional method is with death, but how much fun dying is for the player is questionable.

To be sure, a well-written, colorful death scene, especially in the right tone of book, can be a lot of fun. Some of the most memorable moments of those old fighting fantasy books are some of the crazy death scenes you can get yourself into.

But from a game flow perspective, it just ends the game for the player. This jars them from the game experience, possibly causing them to stop. It's not as fun to fail as to succeed. And it may force them to re-do material they have already gone through, which is not fun, and depending on how demanding that material is, may be tedious enough to drive the player to set the book aside rather than try again.

On the other hand, though success is more fun than failure, success loses that fun factor if failure isn't very likely. If success is spoon-fed to you, it loses it's significance.

So, we're looking at a few factors here:

Challenge Factor: This is a measure of how difficult real success is to achieve. Generally, this is like salt: more of it is better, until you have too much.

but this must be balanced against...

Tedium Factor: Generally, given that this is not real death we are talking about, death in a game means going back and doing it again. For highly content-based games, forcing the player to re-do material they've already done isn't fun the second, or third, or fifth, or tenth time around. Even for more gameplay oriented games, repeating material isn't usually as fun unless it is part of honing the skill of the game.

The only time I see repetition being fun is when the death was a learning experience, and now you get to go back and try again, with more knowledge and skill. When repetition means trying again at something you failed at the first time, learning and trying again until you get it right, it's fun. But if you have to repeat stuff that's not related to why you died, just to get back to the challenge that actually challenges you, that's not as fun.

So the question becomes: In gamebooks, what cost do you impose on the player for failure? Death is just one option for that cost, and effectively what it amounts to is, "go back and try again, you loser." There are two costs in death: one is the cost to status and self-prestige. It's a message to the player, "you didn't make it, try again." The other is a cost to time, in that they are then asked to replay a certain portion of the game. On the other hand, that cost is only a cost if the repetition is unrewarding. Theoretically, getting to try again could be a good thing if it throws you right back into the meaningful, fun part of the gameplay. In that case, the cost of death is only the status cost, the "you failed" message. But while that's not awesome in and of itself, it can heighten the full gameplay experience, if the player feels like they could succeed. In that case, he or she is driven to try again, and success is all the sweeter when it's achieved.

The concept of death in video games perhaps made more sense when these were arcade games, and the cost of failure was a very real one: another $0.25 to keep playing. But even then, the only lure to keep playing is the feeling that you could have gotten it right, with another try maybe you can achieve mastery.

So, what I'm coming to is that ideally, player death in a video game should take them back right to the point where they need to do something different. This presents it's own problems, though, in that perhaps the thing you would need to change is a puzzle, and finding it is part of the challenge.

Let me rephrase: Ideally, player death in a game should reset them to the beginning of the challenge which they failed.

As a followup tenet from that, achieving success with repetition should be a matter of honing player skill, not a matter of luck. There is no satisfaction to hitting a button again and again till it comes up with the "you may proceed" screen. There IS satisfaction in improving personal skill and achieving mastery of a game mechanic.

Hmm... this post has been sort of a random, disorganized rant, and I wound up talking more about how to use death effectively rather than alternatives to death, but I think there's enough here to go ahead and post it. Maybe I'll do a followup on this topic later.

Game Design Principles

I've been working on a game-design related project recently, and so I've been thinking about what core principles are important to keep in mind in designing any game.

1) Don't annoy the player

Many people would put something else in the #1 slot, but I'm really of the opinion that if you annoy the player, nothing else matters. They won't play your game, no matter what awesome x, y or z it has.

Things that annoy players
--> Having stuff they've earned taken away from them.
--> Dying arbitrarily
--> Ever being forced to replay through content they've already played. (ie. dying and losing a lot of progress.)

You get the idea. I'm sure you can add in your own pet peeve here.

2) Mechanics. Mechanics. Mechanics.

Story is great and all, but if they just want a story, they'll read a book. Once a player cuts through the fluff, it's the mechanics that will keep them hooked or chase them away. Good game mechanics challenge the player, force them to think, react, and choose. Good game mechanics teach a skill, and then test them on that skill. (School really should be more fun. People love doing this shit.)

3) Create interesting choices

Interesting choices are ones in which the player doesn't know the correct response, but has enough information to make an educated guess. The results of the choice should make sense in hindsight. Sometimes there isn't one right answer, but the better answer depends on your specific situation and goals. There's often an advantage, and a cost, to each choice, which makes you weigh your options and your strategy, and players like doing that.

4) Deliver meaningful challenges

Meaningful challenges essentially ones which are balanced to the player's skill level. There's a lot that goes into that, but that's essentially what it comes down to.

As we discussed above, a game essentially teaches a skill, then tests that skill. This skill may rely on logic, or reflexes, or both. (Racing games teach you when to swerve and gun it or brake. Fighting games teach you to use button combos. RTS's teach you a high level of game-specific strategy, and also just to click really fast.)

At the end of the day, whatever the skill is that the player is being taught and tested on, the Most Important Thing is that each test be just the right level to challenge a player, forcing them to learn and get a bit better in order to pass it, but not so beyond their current skill level that they can't do it.

That's essentially good game design. Teach a skill, test the skill. Test it harder. When they pass it, now harder. Okay, now even more difficult.

GTG

5) Last, but not least, build your game for a story

Basically, generic games aren't as interesting. At the end of the day, most games are a complicated way for adults to trick themselves into playing "Let's pretend" like they did when they were five. I mean, this isn't strictly required--there are many excellent games with weak stories, and many weak games with excellent stories--but the very best games bring the two together in a way that takes the player to a mystical land of wonder and beauty.

To reach this magical place, you need three things:
A) A compelling story with a strong mood, theme, and pitch.
B) Excellent game mechanics (see above.)
C) The secret ingredient: without sacrificing either of the above, use the mechanics to help tell the story.

If you can do this, and if you're very lucky, then for a minute or two you can make the player feel like they're really there.

At the end of the day, that's what it's all about.